TARA preparation guide

How TARA scoring works

Q: What is a good TARA score?

Nobody can answer this credibly yet. UAT-UK has never published a score distribution, a percentile table or a cut-off for the TARA, and the first sitting window is 12 to 16 October 2026, so no candidate data exists at all. Any specific target score you see quoted has no source behind it. What is known is only the scale: a 1 to 9 score for each of Critical Thinking and Problem Solving, reported to one decimal place, with no pass mark.

Q: When do TARA results come out?

There are two results dates for 2027 entry. Sitting 1, whose test window is 12 to 16 October 2026, releases results on 16 November 2026. Sitting 2, whose window is 4 to 8 January 2027, releases results on 8 February 2027. Which sitting is accepted is set by each university, so check the guidance for the courses you are applying to before you book. Oxford accepts the October sitting only, so Oxford applicants have one window and no second attempt in January.

Q: Is there negative marking on the TARA?

No. Each multiple-choice question is worth one mark and no marks are deducted for a wrong answer. An unanswered question and a wrong answer therefore cost exactly the same, while a guess carries a chance of being right. The correct policy is to answer every question, committing to a best guess before you move on rather than leaving anything blank.

Q: Is the TARA Writing Task marked?

Not by UAT-UK. The Writing Task is unscored, and a copy of your response is sent to the universities where you applied instead. It is compulsory for every candidate. Oxford requires all applicants to sit all three modules, and only two Oxford courses, LN12 Economics and Management and LV11 History and Economics, state that the Writing Task will not be used in admissions selection.

Q: Is there a pass mark for the TARA?

No. There is no pass or fail mark, and no cut-off score has been published. The TARA produces two scores on a 1 to 9 scale, and nothing has been published about what universities do with them once they arrive.

Q: Do I get one TARA score or two?

The official description is of a separate score for Critical Thinking and a separate score for Problem Solving, each on the 1 to 9 scale and each reported to one decimal place. The Writing Task module produces no score and is passed to universities as it is. The safest way to think about it is two scores plus one unscored piece of writing.

The TARA produces two numerical scores and one piece of writing that never receives a mark. Critical Thinking and Problem Solving are reported separately on a scale from 1 to 9, to one decimal place. The Writing Task is passed to universities unmarked. Beyond that the published picture is thin: UAT-UK has released no score distribution, no percentile table and no cut-off, and nobody has sat the test yet. This page sets out what is actually known about TARA marking, when scores are released for each sitting, and how to think about your own result when no public benchmark exists.

6 sections2,024 words11 min read4 official sources

Practise 51 TARA papers (2 free)Full TARA guide

Papers: 51
Questions: 2153
Free to try: 2

TARA Scoring at a Glance

Score scale: A separate 1 to 9 score for Critical Thinking and for Problem Solving, to one decimal place
Writing Task: Compulsory but unscored; a copy of your response goes to your universities
Penalties and pass mark: One mark per question, nothing deducted for a wrong answer, no pass mark
Official benchmark: No distribution, no percentile table, no cut-off; the first window is 12 to 16 October 2026
Results days: 16 Nov 2026 (sitting 1) and 8 Feb 2027 (sitting 2)

All of the above comes from the UAT-UK TARA page, its published timetable and the official specification. Nobody has sat the test yet, and no official past paper exists.

Two scores, reported to one decimal place

The TARA reports two numbers. UAT-UK states on its TARA page: "They score on a scale from 1 (low) to 9 (high), with results reported to one decimal place." One score covers Critical Thinking, the other covers Problem Solving, and each is reported on its own. The official description is of a separate score for each multiple-choice module, so it is more accurate to talk about your two TARA scores than about a single TARA score.

The TARA: three modules, 120 minutes in total

All three are compulsory for every candidate, each separately timed at 40 minutes

Critical Thinking22 questions in 40 minutes

Reported as one score from 1 to 9, to one decimal place
One mark per question, nothing deducted

Problem Solving22 questions in 40 minutes

Reported as a second score on the same 1 to 9 scale
No subject knowledge required, basic maths only

Writing Task40 minutes, one of three prompts, 750-word limit

Produces no number at all
A copy of the response is sent to universities

Tap a branch to unfold

The reporting precision matters more than it looks. A score given to one decimal place, such as 5.8 or 6.3, is plainly not a count of correct answers. Each multiple-choice module contains 22 questions in 40 minutes, so a raw mark can only be a whole number out of 22, while the reported score sits on a 1 to 9 scale carrying a decimal. What UAT-UK has published is the scale and the precision. It has not published how the two relate.

Compulsory modules

All three, no exceptions

The same for every candidate

Unused time

Simply lost

Finishing early does not buy minutes for the next module

Format

Computer-based throughout

An erasable booklet is provided for working

Calculators and dictionaries

Not permitted in any module

The rule applies across all three

One mark per question, nothing deducted

1 mark

What every multiple-choice question is worth

0 marks

Deducted for a wrong answer

22 questions

In each 40-minute multiple-choice module

Under 1m 50s

Time per question if you spread it evenly

There is no penalty for guessing, which leaves exam technique with a single conclusion: never leave a blank . A question you have no idea about is still worth answering, because an unanswered question and a wrong answer are worth exactly the same, and a guess is worth more than nothing. There is also no pass mark and no fail mark. The TARA produces two numbers, and what those numbers are worth is decided by the universities reading them.

The arithmetic of the timing is worth internalising. Twenty-two questions in 40 minutes sets the same rhythm in both Critical Thinking and Problem Solving. Since wrong answers cost nothing, the expensive mistake is not a wrong answer, it is spending six minutes on one stubborn question and never reaching the easy ones at the end. The straightforward habit is to put down your best available answer as soon as a question stops yielding and move on, so nothing is left blank behind you.

Number

Fractions, place value, percentages, the four rules of number

The official expectation for Problem Solving is basic maths only

Measures

Averages, time, money and measures

Including the relationships between km, m, cm, mm and between kg and g

Not required

Complex fraction and decimal calculation

Consistent with calculators being banned

Subject knowledge

Not tested

A question that looks computation-heavy usually means a shorter route was missed

The Writing Task is not marked, but it is sent to universities

The Writing Task is easy to misread, because it is compulsory but unscored. UAT-UK does not mark it. What happens instead is that a copy of your response is sent to the universities where you applied, and they decide what to do with it. That makes it high-stakes in a different way from the two multiple-choice modules: there is no number to optimise and nothing about it appears in your results, but an admissions tutor may read your actual prose, unedited, written in 40 minutes.

	States the Writing Task is not used in selection	Carries no such line
Oxford courses	Only two: LN12 Economics and Management, LV11 History and Economics	The other eight, including PPE, Experimental Psychology, Human Sciences and History and Politics
How to treat it	That course has said it will not use the piece in selection	Assume the piece will be read

Oxford's position is that all Oxford applicants must sit all three modules, Writing Task included.

The format is fixed and worth rehearsing. Each of the three prompts gives a short statement and then asks the same three things in the same order.

01Part 1

Explain what you think the statement means

Start from the statement you are given and set out what it is actually claiming.

02Part 2

Give a reasoned argument against it

The second part asks for a reasoned counter-argument, not a bare statement of disagreement.

03Part 3

Say to what extent you agree

Finish by saying how far you agree. Detailed subject knowledge is neither expected nor required.

Plan for 5 to 10 minutes before writing

UAT-UK recommends planning first and grouping your ideas under the three parts, so the structure is settled before you start writing.

Engage with the actual wording

Engage closely with the wording of the statement rather than the general topic area, and treat broad or abstract terms with some nuance.

Argue both sides

Argue both sides and use targeted concrete examples, without letting the examples carry the argument on their own.

Build the counter-argument out

Build the counter-argument from several different angles instead of padding it with background.

State your own view clearly at the end

Finish by stating your own view clearly and in enough depth, supported by your earlier arguments rather than simply summarising them.

What is a good TARA score? Nobody can tell you yet

This is the question every candidate asks, and the honest answer is that nobody can tell you, including us. More fundamentally, the TARA was sat for the first time only in October 2025, and UAT-UK has published nothing about how that first cohort scored, so there is nothing from which a benchmark could be built.

Score distribution

Never published

UAT-UK has released no TARA distribution of any kind

Percentiles and cut-offs

Never published

No mean, no median and no band descriptors either

Pass mark

Does not exist

There is no threshold you clear or miss

Candidate data

None yet

The first sitting window is 12 to 16 October 2026

That has a blunt implication. Any specific TARA target score in circulation is invented. A confident number, a percentile chart, or a claim that a particular course expects a particular score cannot be traced to any source, because the source does not exist. Treat a specific figure as an unsourced guess.

Nor can a benchmark be imported from elsewhere. UAT-UK says the Critical Thinking and Problem Solving components share a common history with BMAT Section 1 and the TSA, and on that basis it hosts BMAT Section 1 papers from 2003 to 2023 and TSA Section 1 papers from 2008 to 2023 on its preparation materials page. That is as far as the official statement goes, and it says nothing about how TARA scores will be spread. Figures attached to a different test, taken by a different cohort under different rules, do not transfer.

The useful conclusion is not despairing, it is narrowing. You cannot aim at a public number, so aim at the things that are genuinely under your control and observable in your own practice.

What to do instead of chasing a number

Start from what the score is: one input. UAT-UK produces the two scores and sends a copy of your Writing Task response to the universities where you applied, and each university decides what to do with what it receives. Two Oxford courses state that they will not use the Writing Task in admissions selection while others say nothing of the kind, which shows directly that the same material can be treated differently from course to course. Beyond that, nothing has been published about how a TARA result is weighed against the rest of an application, and we are not going to invent it.

01Step 1

Answer every question

No negative marking means an unanswered question is a guaranteed zero and a guess is not. In practice, commit to an answer before you move past a question, so the module clock never runs out on a blank you meant to come back to.

02Step 2

Practise in 40-minute blocks

The pressure in the TARA comes from the module clock, and unused time does not carry over, so the timing has to be rehearsed at full length rather than in loose sessions.

03Step 3

Sit the two official practice tests

UAT-UK says the two tests on the Pearson VUE landing page mirror the exact format and software used for the live tests, which makes them official material that reproduces the on-screen experience.

04Step 4

Read the Question Guide by type

Critical Thinking is described as seven question types and Problem Solving as three, and the guide itself notes that a question can fall into more than one of the Problem Solving categories. Diagnosing which type you are slow at is far more actionable than a single overall percentage.

05Step 5

Track your accuracy per type over time

With no public benchmark available, your own trend line is the measure you can actually work with.

18 papers

Original parallel TARA papers from FrontierVUE

45 questions

In each paper, over 120 minutes

350 questions

In the topic bank, for drilling one question type at a time

1,160 questions

In total, every one with a worked solution and a Chinese translation

These are papers we write ourselves against the published specification. They are not official past papers, and no official TARA past paper exists. Papers 1 and 2 are free to attempt.

When results arrive

For 2027 entry there are two sittings, and the results date for each is fixed.

2026 – 2027Timeline

Sep 26

Oct 26

Nov 26

Dec 26

Jan 27

Feb 27

Booking closes for the October sitting

28 Sep 2026

Booking for the October sitting closes at 6pm BST on 28 September 2026, the last moment to secure an October seat.

Sitting 1 test window

12 to 16 Oct 2026

The first test window for 2027 entry runs from 12 to 16 October 2026.

Fixed TARA day in China, Hong Kong and Macau

14 Oct 2026

In China, Hong Kong and Macau each test has a fixed day inside the window rather than a choice of days, and the TARA day is 14 October 2026.

Sitting 1 results

16 Nov 2026

Results for the first sitting are released on 16 November 2026.

Sitting 2 test window

4 to 8 Jan 2027

The second test window runs from 4 to 8 January 2027.

Sitting 2 results

8 Feb 2027

Results for the second sitting are released on 8 February 2027.

Hard deadline Event WindowBoth sittings exist and the results dates are as above. Which sitting your course accepts is a matter for the university you are applying to, and you should follow that university's own guidance.

The UAT-UK timetable sets the test windows and the results dates; it does not decide which sitting a given university or course requires, and requirements can differ between institutions and between courses. So the first step in planning is to confirm on your target institution's admissions pages which sitting it expects, and then work back from the dates above.

Fee (UK and Ireland)

78 GBP

Fee (rest of the world)

133 GBP

October booking deadline

28 September 2026

6pm BST

China, Hong Kong and Macau

TARA fixed on 14 October 2026

No choice of day inside the window

Plan backwards from the booking deadline rather than from the test date. 28 September 2026 is the last moment to secure an October seat, and in China, Hong Kong and Macau the fixed 14 October date leaves almost no flexibility if it collides with something else. Once the modules are sat there is nothing further to influence: the two scores arrive on the published date, and your Writing Task response is passed to the universities you applied to rather than returned to you as a mark.

FAQ

Frequently asked questions

What is a good TARA score?

Nobody can answer this credibly yet. UAT-UK has never published a score distribution, a percentile table or a cut-off for the TARA, and the first sitting window is 12 to 16 October 2026, so no candidate data exists at all. Any specific target score you see quoted has no source behind it. What is known is only the scale: a 1 to 9 score for each of Critical Thinking and Problem Solving, reported to one decimal place, with no pass mark.

When do TARA results come out?

There are two results dates for 2027 entry. Sitting 1, whose test window is 12 to 16 October 2026, releases results on 16 November 2026. Sitting 2, whose window is 4 to 8 January 2027, releases results on 8 February 2027. Which sitting is accepted is set by each university, so check the guidance for the courses you are applying to before you book. Oxford accepts the October sitting only, so Oxford applicants have one window and no second attempt in January.

Is there negative marking on the TARA?

No. Each multiple-choice question is worth one mark and no marks are deducted for a wrong answer. An unanswered question and a wrong answer therefore cost exactly the same, while a guess carries a chance of being right. The correct policy is to answer every question, committing to a best guess before you move on rather than leaving anything blank.

Is the TARA Writing Task marked?

Not by UAT-UK. The Writing Task is unscored, and a copy of your response is sent to the universities where you applied instead. It is compulsory for every candidate. Oxford requires all applicants to sit all three modules, and only two Oxford courses, LN12 Economics and Management and LV11 History and Economics, state that the Writing Task will not be used in admissions selection.

Is there a pass mark for the TARA?

No. There is no pass or fail mark, and no cut-off score has been published. The TARA produces two scores on a 1 to 9 scale, and nothing has been published about what universities do with them once they arrive.

Do I get one TARA score or two?

The official description is of a separate score for Critical Thinking and a separate score for Problem Solving, each on the 1 to 9 scale and each reported to one decimal place. The Writing Task module produces no score and is passed to universities as it is. The safest way to think about it is two scores plus one unscored piece of writing.

SOURCES

Official sources

MORE GUIDES

Other TARA preparation guides

Learn it as a lesson

About the test

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The student version of this guide: one sitting to read, checked as soon as you finish.

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