Timothy Peck July 9, 2024 8 ACT Info and Tips,SAT Info and Tips

When Should You Take the SAT/ACT?

What’s Covered:

• What’s the Ideal Timeline for Taking the SAT or ACT?
• When Can I Take the SAT or ACT?
• Can You Take the SAT or ACT Too Early?
• Can You Take the SAT or ACT Too Late?
• The Impact of the SAT/ACT on Your Chances of Acceptance

There’s a lot to know about how to earn an attention-grabbing SAT or ACT score, such as memorizing math formulas, becoming familiar with grammatical rules, and improving your vocabulary. However, there’s also a logistical side to getting a standout score: having a thoughtful timeline for taking standardized tests can be just as crucial as knowing the actual content.

Are Some Test Dates Easier Than Others?

Let’s start by throwing this one right out the window. Don’t base your choice of when to take the SAT or ACT on which test dates are rumored to be the easiest. The idea that you can score higher on some test dates than others is a myth.

In fact, the College Board (the organization that administers the SAT) and ACT use a process called equating to account for differences in difficulty between different versions of the tests. Equating ensures consistency among test scores, and eliminates any advantage offered by taking a slightly easier version of one of the exams.

To learn more about how the SAT and ACT are scored, and why your score won’t go up just because you took the test during a particular month, check out our posts How Does the Scoring Curve Work for the ACT? and How Does the Curve Work for the SAT?

What’s the Best Timeline for Taking the SAT or ACT?

For best results, we recommend the following timelines. If you’ve already decided which test you’re taking, you can follow the timeline for that one, or you can combine the two until you identify which test format works best for you.

The Ideal SAT Preparation Timeline

1. Take the PSAT 8/9 in your freshman year and the PSAT 10 as a sophomore to get used to standardized testing.

2. During the summer before your junior year, take a practice SAT to learn your baseline score. You can take the practice test yourself at home (in a quiet room, with the correct timing for each section) or attend a formal practice test at a prep center (Princeton Review offers free, full-length digital SAT practice tests).

3. Sit for the PSAT/NMSQT in the fall of your junior year. Aim to complete the bulk of your SAT preparation before the PSAT/NMSQT test date to increase your chances of being named a National Merit Semifinalist.

4. Study to take the official SAT for the first time in the spring of your junior year–usually in March or May.

5. Take the SAT a second time, either over the summer or in the early fall during your senior year (typically in August or October) to improve your score. According to the College Board, most students who take the SAT a second time improve their scores.

6. If you’re still unsatisfied with your score, you can take the test a third time later in the fall of your senior year. Just make sure you’ll get your scores back in time for any Early Action or Early Decision deadlines, and also be honest with yourself about whether you’re likely to significantly increase your score during a third sitting. Senior fall is a busy time, and it’s possible that you’d boost your chances at your top-choice schools more by focusing your energy on, say, your essays.

The Ideal ACT Preparation Timeline

1. Take the PreACT in your sophomore year to get accustomed to standardized testing.

2. In the summer before your junior year, take a practice ACT to learn your baseline score. You can take the practice test yourself at home (in a quiet room, with the correct timing for each section) or take a formal practice test at a prep center (like those offered by the Princeton Review, which also administers full-length ACT practice tests).

3. If you want to qualify for a National Merit Scholarship, sit for the PSAT/NMSQT as a junior. Do some PSAT-specific studying if you’re aiming for National Merit status, as the PSAT has a different structure and slightly different content than the ACT.

4. Study to take the official ACT for the first time in the spring of your junior year–the test is usually offered in February and April.

5. Study for the ACT during the summer once you don’t have schoolwork on your plate anymore, and take the test in either July or September. Like with the SAT, according to the ACT most students improve their ACT scores when they take the test a second time.

6. If your score still needs some work, take the ACT again later in the fall of your senior year. Again, though, like with the SAT, be thoughtful about where your time and energy will be best allocated, and make sure you’ll have your scores back in time to send them to any schools you’re applying to early.

General Test-Taking Timeline Tips

The timelines above are just guidelines. If you have extenuating circumstances, when to take the SAT or ACT could be different for you. It may make sense for you to skip some of these steps or move your timeline around a bit. 

For example, if you have substantial commitments your junior year, consider taking your exam at the very end of your sophomore year. Or, if you take an SAT practice test and discover it’s not for you, switching to the ACT may mean that you officially sit for the test for the first time during the summer, which will push the timeline back.

Whatever approach you take, we advise against sitting for the SAT or ACT more than three times. As noted above, even taking one of these tests a third time is something you should think hard about. You’ll be juggling a lot during the college application process, and you want to make sure you’re spending your time productively—be realistic about whether you’re going to be able to boost your score significantly, or if you’d be better off focusing on your grades, extracurriculars, or essays.

Lastly, recognize that studying for the SAT or ACT is a serious commitment. The more focused you are during your preparation the first time around, the more likely you are to lock in a score you’re happy with right away, and avoid needing to take the test a second or third time. You’ll save a lot of time and stress in the long run by setting aside two or three months and studying intensively upfront.

When Can I Take the SAT or ACT?

The SAT is offered roughly once a month during the academic year, with a winter break separating fall and spring test dates, as seniors are focused on essays by this point and juniors typically haven’t quite dived fully into the college process yet. Here are all the dates the SAT is being offered for this school year:

The ACT offers test sittings on a similar monthly schedule throughout the academic year, with the same winter break:

Can You Take the SAT or ACT Too Early?

Officially, there’s no such thing as taking the SAT or ACT too early–you can register for these tests at any age. However, much of the content on both of them is covered in your high school classes, so if you take the test in your freshman year, you likely won’t have learned a lot of the material yet, and thus won’t be setting yourself up for success.

Additionally, taking the test too many times can raise red flags for admissions officers, as they may think you’re trying to luck your way into a high score, rather than taking each sitting seriously. While some schools allow you to choose which scores you send, others require you to send scores for all sittings.

Plus, as noted above, studying for these tests is time-consuming, and it’s not like you won’t have other things going on during your high school career! To summarize, taking the test twice a year throughout high school likely isn’t your best bet, and also ends up being quite expensive, as there is a fee to register for the SAT. 

Instead of starting to take the SAT or ACT extra early, we recommend that you get the ball rolling by taking the PSAT or PreACT in your sophomore year. These practice tests will help you start familiarizing yourself with standardized tests, without the pressure and structure of the real thing.

Can You Take the SAT or ACT Too Late?

The hard deadline for taking the SAT or ACT is roughly a month before your first college applications are due, to ensure you have enough time to receive and send your standardized test scores to the schools you’re applying to. When planning your SAT/ACT preparation, you’ll ideally have at least some sense of where you’d like to apply, so you can keep those schools’ deadlines in mind–particularly if you intend to apply for early admission.

Make sure you know which deadlines your schools have for standardized test scores specifically. Some have a separate deadline for standardized test scores, which is later than the main application deadline, others require everything to be in on the same date–say, November 1. Application deadlines are strict, so you want to be sure you’re planning backwards from the correct date.

You also ideally won’t wait until the last possible test administration date, as with that approach, you won’t have time to retake the exam. Even if you’re confident in your prep, don’t eliminate the possibility of a retake up front, since most students experience the greatest increase in scores between the first and second test administration, mostly due to less stress, more targeted preparation, and/or more familiarity with the exam.

In general, if you’re applying for Early Decision, you need to plan on taking your final round of standardized tests no later than the October or November administration deadlines during your senior year of high school. For the 2024-25 application cycle, the test dates to circle are October 5 and November 2 for the SAT, and September 14 and October 26 for the ACT. 

If you are applying for Regular Decision, your application deadline is likely in December or January, so your final chance to take the SAT will be on December 7, and December 14 for the ACT.

The Impact of the SAT/ACT on Your Chances of Acceptance

Even with the expansion of test-optional policies, a strong standardized test score is still a key component of many successful college applications, especially at highly selective institutions. While the SAT and ACT aren’t perfect, they’re effective at evaluating skills crucial to succeeding in college, and a strong score can help show admissions officers you’re prepared for more rigorous coursework.

If you’re wondering what kind of SAT or ACT score you should aim for, check out CollegeVine’s free chancing engine, which evaluates a variety of factors like grades, course rigor, extracurriculars, and standardized test scores to estimate your odds of being accepted at over 1,600 schools across the country. You can enter your test scores—or hypothetical ones if you haven’t taken the exam yet—and see how much a higher or lower score would impact your chances.

Our admissions calculator can also give you suggestions for how to boost your chances of acceptance, whether by earning a higher standardized test score, or some other step, like taking a more rigorous course load your senior year.