| Home » Kaplan GMAT 800: Advanced Prep for Advanced Students (Kaplan GMAT Advanced) | | | | | | | Description: | | Top-tier business schools routinely accept only 20 percent of their applicants. Students who aspire to get the highest scores can count on Kaplan GMAT 800 to help them accomplish their goals. Developed for students who want to score in the top 10 percent, Kaplan GMAT 800 provides the additional preparation needed. Hundreds of the toughest practice questions, the hardest concepts, and the best strategies are included. Tips for test taking, proven strategies for getting a perfect score of 800, and focused guidelines for tackling each question type all combine for the ideal preparation tool for the most ambitious student. A recent Harris Poll found that Kaplan succeeds in getting more people into business school than any other competitive course combined. Kaplan GMAT 800 is the first step toward attaining that goal and taking applicants from ordinary to extraordinary. | | | Product Details: | | | Author:
| Kaplan | | Paperback:
| 384 pages | | Publisher:
| Kaplan Publishing | | Publication Date:
| April 06, 2010 | | Language:
| English | | ISBN:
| 1419553429 | | Product Length:
| 8.39 inches | | Product Width:
| 0.75 inches | | Product Height:
| 10.91 inches | | Product Weight:
| 1.98 pounds | | Package Length:
| 10.79 inches | | Package Width:
| 8.43 inches | | Package Height:
| 0.87 inches | | Package Weight:
| 1.94 pounds | | Average Customer Rating:
|  based on 28 reviews |
| |
| | Customer Reviews: | |
Average Customer Review:
 ( 28 customer reviews )
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
107 of 113 found the following review helpful:
 Poor Guidebook but a Good Question CollectionApr 13, 2010
By GMAT Club (Expert)
"BB"
I am not blasting this book - I am giving you a rating based on the expectation that the description of this book sets. It does not live up and you are bound to be disappointed. However, it is actually a valuable book but you need to be aware of what you are buying and probably how to use it best when you buy it:
As a pure guidebook - 1 star
As a question collection - 3.5 stars
What You Will Find Inside:
28 Critical reasoning questions
31 Reading comprehension questions
110 Sentence correction questions
107 Problem solving questions (only 7 of which cover combinations and probability)
37 Data Sufficiency questions
***** CONS *****
* No review of math principles or grammar rules. This book assumes that you have gone through the Kaplan's main GMAT book. If you need help with basics look into getting the Math or Verbal Workbooks before getting this one.
* Illogical structure. Instead of the typical approach of providing a rule and then questions to practice that rule on, this book just lists questions in each of the sections. All of the valuable information and tips are scattered around the explanations section. The book assumes you will read/review explanations for every question. In defense, the main point is often emphasized, so they are not too hard to find.
* Question difficulty. Fewer than 50 people per year score 800 on the GMAT, and most of the lucky guys get past 700. To appeal to a broad audience, Kaplan designed this book at a 650/700-level
* Math section is fairly easy and lacks meaningful practice in advanced subjects such as probability, combinations, or coordinate geometry, statistics. If these are your weak areas, you should look elsewhere
***** PROS *****
* The book does what it was supposed to do - provide advanced selection of questions, giving the necessary practice with relevant questions. Though Kaplan's questions are not one-for-one official GMAT questions, I found them fairly close overall. I also liked the explanations - they were very detailed
* Good verbal section with valuable RC practice; huge selection of SC's
* Good quality publishing and paper; good layout
* Price - I thought it was worth every penny :)
Bottom Line: This is not a guidebook or a book to start with - if you need to get better in a certain question type, then get it but don't expect it to be sufficient to give you the background often needed to score 700+.
[+++] Here is the list of the hardest questions in the book (if this is all you are looking for).
CR tough questions:
Chapter 2: Prob # 3, 7
Chapter 3: #9,10,11
Chapter 4: #1,2,4,7,9,10,13,16,20,21,27
RC tough questions:
Chapter5: Has no questions
Chapter6: Passage 1: #1, #4, Passage 2: #1, #3, Passage 3: #4, Passage 4: #3
Chapter7: Passage 1: #2, Passage 2:None, Passage 3: #3, #4, Passage 4: #1, #2.
Sentence Correction
Chapter 8- no questions
Chapter 9: Ques #: 8,10,13,15,16,19,20,25,27,29,32,35,36,37
Chapter10: Ques #: 44,45,46,49,57,58,59,60,62,63,64,66,67,68,72
Chapter 11: Ques #: 2,6,11,14,16,23,25,27,29,34,35,36,37,39
QUANT/MATH
Chapter 12: no questions
Chapter 13: #14
Chapter 14: #3
Chapter 15: #13
Chapter 16: no questions
Chapter 17: #3,16,17,27,28,29,36
Chapter 18: #9
Chapter 19: #1,3,7
Chapter 20: No questions
Chapter 21: #7
Chapter 22: #4,8,16,17,18
FYI: This book is the re-branded edition of a book previously called Kaplan GMAT Advanced
The two books are identical in terms of content (very minor changes); for exact changes see:
CHANGES IN THIS EDITION:
* CR Section: Several questions have been clarified/corrected
* RC Section: Half-page write up about Road Mapping passages; periods have been added at the end of each answer choice
* SC Section: Unchanged
* PS Section: Extra note added to the strategy section to double-check answers at the end
* DS Section: New sentence in the DS strategy section; several explanations have been clarified/corrected. Parentheses added for answer choices
--------------------------------
I regularly review all and every GMAT book - do not hesitate to post your questions here; I reply to comments!
BB, Founder of GMAT Club, GMAT 750.
45 of 51 found the following review helpful:
 Best book to get into the best schoolsMay 26, 2010
By ty-books
I strongly disagree with the one-star review given here and feel compelled to give my own take.
This books is tough and painful to get through. But, if you are serious about getting into a Top 10 Business School, then this is the best book you can get. Look, if you are even considering a Top 10 school you probably score reasonably well on the GMAT to begin with. This book is a collection of the toughest questions that can be found. It gives some guidance on how to get through the questions, but the real value is simply going through them all and figuring out the patterns yourself. I was scoring in the high 600's before this book. I then spent about an hour every night going through it until I had done every question in every section twice. It was painful, to be sure, but the 780 I got at the end of it all made it all worthwhile.
This book is not for everyone. If you are an average test taker or student you will simply find this book to be too nuanced and specific for your needs and it will likely not help you much. But, if you are a serious candidate for the top schools, this is a really great book and is something I recommend to everyone I meet who is applying to top tier b-schools.
11 of 13 found the following review helpful:
 Has useful techniques, but not as difficult as they claimOct 26, 2010
By KNJ
"KNJ"
I bought this book to supplement my core preparation materials, namely The Official Guide, some Manhattan books and the Kaplan Premier Program book. To give some relevant background, my initial diagnostic score was approx. 600, and my latest practice score is 750: Quantitative 77th percentile, Verbal 98th percentile. The 750 was an unexpected surprise, but since I wasn't happy with my Quant percentile I referred to Kaplan 800.
There are some good time-saving techniques in this book, but overall an advanced student won't find every page challenging or even useful. Most, if not all, of the "challenging" Quant questions are covered in the Official Guide. From my experience, you will face a greater depth and breadth of challenging questions by practicing the last third of the questions in the Official Guide, and most importantly reviewing your mistakes diligently. With a 77th Quant percentile in a practice test, I'm obviously not a genius in Math who would find most concepts super-simple; like most students, I'm someone who needed a lot of basic practice to get to where I am now. Given that similarity, I think most fellow test-takers won't benefit immensely from Kaplan 800.
However, it is possible that students will find the Verbal section useful. My verbal score was already at an advanced level before picking up this book, but I still found some of its techniques noteworthy. This book doesn't offer a large number of practice questions, rather it focuses on theory, which it then exemplifies through a couple of questions following each theoretical concept. The concepts, as I mentioned, can be useful, but as the book itself states they are not comprehensive. If you want comprehensive, go Manhattan.
Overall, my recommendation is to focus instead on the Official Guide, Manhattan books depending on the areas you need to focus on the most, and the main Kaplan book (especially the Kaplan practice tests). This set of materials was recommended to me by someone who got a 760, and I know others who've used the same; their scores were 740 and 710. Save your money and (more importantly?) your time instead of perusing this book. Good luck!
2 of 2 found the following review helpful:
Excellent complement materialDec 09, 2010
By Alejandro Hardziej
If you are looking to improve your 600+ score, this book is ideal. I would only recommend it for the final stage of your preparation, and only if you are very ambitious about your score.
PROS
- Questions for every section are challenging.
- Detailed answers/explanations
- Content structure makes the book easy to follow
CONS
- Strategies are not covered in depth
The book shouldn't be taken as reference material, but rather as an additional practice before your exam.
1 of 1 found the following review helpful:
Difficult but helpful prep materialJun 14, 2010
By Matt
As the title of the book suggests, this book is geared towards advanced students. I would not suggest this book for people looking for a general GMAT prep guide. However, for test takers looking to be challenged, this is the ideal book.
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