Are idioms important for the GMAT exam?

Yes, ‘idioms’ is a very important topic for your GMAT exam. According to the GMAT the Official Guide, about 3-4 questions test your idioms knowledge out of the 13-14 Sentence Correction questions on the GMAT Verbal Section.

How to memorise idioms for the GMAT Verbal Reasoning section?

The best way to remember idioms for the GMAT Verbal reasoning section is to make manual or digital flashcards.

What are the types of questions asked in the Verbal Reasoning section?

The Verbal Reasoning section contains questions on GMAT reading comprehension, critical reasoning, and sentence correction.

Is the GMAT Verbal Reasoning section hard?

The GMAT Verbal Reasoning section is not hard. Take GMAT practice tests and analyse your answers to understand the exam format very well.

How to improve English language skills for the GMAT?

Practice reading English newspapers and magazines daily. Make a habit of essay writing in English to improve your proficiency.

GMAT Idioms: Find Common GMAT Idioms List to Ace your Preparation

GMAT Idioms are known to be an integral part of the English language. It is a generally used set of words that have an exclusive meaning in a grouping; idioms are verified in sentence correction questions in the GMAT verbal section. Sentence correction questions will display a moderately underlined sentence, asking you to choose between four rewritten replacements for the underlined portion or leaving the sentence as it is.

The right answer choice will correct both the grammar of the sentence and the inaccurately used idiom. So, to learn more about GMAT sentence correction idioms, we have listed all the information about GMAT Idioms in this article.

Table Of Content

GMAT Syllabus and Number Of Questions
How to Improve Idioms for GMAT?
Best Books For Common GMAT Idioms
Comprehensive GMAT Idioms List

GMAT Syllabus and Number Of Questions

The distribution of questions in the Verbal Reasoning section of the GMAT is as follows -

The total number of questions - 36

of Reading Comprehension questions - 13 to 14
of Critical Reasoning questions - 9 to 10
of Sentence Corrections questions - 12 to 13 (Approximately 3 to 4 questions on idioms)

How to Improve Idioms for GMAT?

Overall, learning GMAT idioms presents a bit more of a task for non-native English speakers. So, to make it easy for you, we have stated below some tips on practising GMAT Idioms.

1. Prepare GMAT Idiom Flashcards

The best method of knowing the common GMAT idioms is to make your own idiom flashcards. On the front of a flashcard, write the idioms and phrases for GMAT and on the backside, write an example for it. Alternatively, if you don’t want to create manual flashcards, you can download a flashcard app to make digital flashcards. For example, GMAT Idiom Flashcards app by Magoosh is a free app that you can download on your phone to practise idioms.

2. Build Idiom Knowledge From GMAT Resources

There are various idioms and phrases for GMAT. But to learn more and get aware of new idioms words you can gather different resources to acknowledge new GMAT idioms, you can start reading newspapers, magazines and other collective English language books which can help you to get familiar with GMAT idioms list.

3. Include GMAT Idioms in Daily Writing

It is a helpful technique for learning GMAT sentence correction idioms through writing. Make a habit of incorporating GMAT idioms while preparing study notes for yourself. The more you practise using idioms correctly in your writing, the more you will notice the incorrect idiom usage in the actual GMAT sentence correction questions.

4. Use Logic Along With Memorization

Always analyse the structure and meaning of the given sentence logically to get the GMAT sentence correction idioms right. You can choose the correct idioms by analysing whether the words are grouped correctly and the words that fit into the context of sentences are right or not.

Best Books for Common GMAT Idioms

The verbal reasoning section requires a lot of GMAT idioms practice for non-native English speakers. We have shortlisted some GMAT preparation books to help you learn new words and increase your vocabulary.

Name of Books	Features of the Book
The Official Guide for GMAT Verbal Review	- Consists of more than 300 previous GMAT questions - Available in both ebook and paperback version
Manhattan GMAT Sentence Correction Strategy Guide	- Contains all the grammar rules and principles; covers topics: pronouns and parallelism - Comes with a comprehensive list of idioms
Kaplan GMAT Verbal Workbook	- Contains practice questions and test-taking strategies - Provides detailed explanation for every answer
PowerScore's GMAT Critical Reasoning Bible	- Provides tips and tricks for selecting correct answers, increasing accuracy and speed - Breaks down GMAT arguments with explanation
Manhattan Prep's GMAT Foundations of Verbal	- Consists of grammar topics: parts of speech and sentence structure - Has strategies for solving different types of questions
The Critical Reader: The Complete GMAT Sentence Correction Guide	- Reviews all the grammatical concepts with practice questions at the end of every chapter - Contains additional 150+ MCQ questions for practice with detailed explanation

Comprehensive GMAT Idioms List

In order to prepare for the verbal reasoning section, you must be familiar with the most common GMAT idioms. The following list is:

A	account for, accuse of, acquaint with, agree to, agree with, agree on, amount to, angry at, appear to, apply to, argue with, associate with, a result of, ability to, act as, act like, ask for, allow for, appeal to
B	based on, believe to be, between A and B, both A and B
C	capable of, center on, choice of, choose from, choose to, collaborate with, compare with/to, composed of, concerned with, consider to be, consist of, consistent with, correspond to, correspond with, credit to
D	deal with, defend against, define as, depend on, descend from, descendant of, differ from, different from, decide on, delighted to, depicted as, doubt that
E	elect as, elect to, enable to, essential to, estimate to be, either/or, extend to, extent of
F	fascinated by, from A to B
I	identical with, in contrast to, in contrast with, in order to, in violation of, independent from, independent of, indifferent to, instead of, in search of, indicate that, invest in
J	just as
L	less than, likely to
M	meet with, move away from
N	native of, native to, neither/nor, not/but, not only/but also, not so much/as
O	on account of, opposed to, opposite of, originate from, originate in, originate with
P	potential to, preferable to, prejudiced against, prior to, protect against
R	regard as, rather than, replace with, require to, required of, responsibility to, responsible for, result from, result in, result of, refer to, resulting in
S	same as, separate from, subject to, superior to, suspicious of, sympathy for, sympathise with, sequence of, speak about, speak from, subscribe to
T	target at, type of
U	use as, use of
V	view as, vote for
W	willing to, worry about

Memorising the above-mentioned GMAT idioms list will take a lot of practice. So it is advisable to study the topic of idioms from the very beginning of your GMAT preparation. Keep at least 4 to 6 months’ time in hand for covering the GMAT syllabus for 4 different sections - Quantitative Reasoning, Verbal Reasoning, Integrated Reasoning and Analytical Writing. And if you want to know more about the GMAT exam sign up on Yocket and get your queries answered.