SAT Verbal Analogies

SAT Test Structure

The analogies will follow the sentence completion questions. You will see a total of 19 analogy questions, 6 in one 30 minute verbal section and 13 in the other. Each group of analogy questions will be arranged in order of difficulty.

An analogy is two words with a direct relationship

In other words, you won't see NEWSPAPER : WATCH :: in your SAT test. Why? Because there is no direct relationship between newspaper and watch and they are, therefore, not an analogy.

What not to do

The biggest mistake we have encountered with analogies are students who want to insist on approaching them by saying "Wallet is to money as ..." While this may sound official, it is the wrong way to approach the analogies questions.

The right way to approach the SAT analogies

Make up a short sentence that includes both words in the analogy. Example: A wallet contains money. (It's supposed to anyway.) Try to keep this sentence short and use an active verb whenever possible. If you still have a problem (say because the sentence you created fits most or even all of the answer choices) go back and make the question more specific.

Process of elimination is your friend

As with other sections of the SAT, you will probably be able to use our advice to eliminate at least one of the answer choices and increase the benefit from guessing.

Use the SAT's own restrictive rules to your personal advantage!

If you are faced with an analogy and you are unsure if the words are to be used as verbs, adjectives, or nouns, check the answer choices. The SAT requires that all of its choices agree with the analogy pair for parts of speech. This should help you form a good sentence.

Consider all the choices

Also keep in mind, the SAT asks you for the best answer choice. Sometimes the best choice is not perfect. Even if you think you see the best answer choice immediately, do spend at least a few seconds considering the other choices in case one of these proves to be even better.

Don't get tripped up on vocabulary

There are anywhere between 500 and 1,000 vocabulary words that show up rather consistently on the SAT. This may sound like a lot of words, but with a few hours of study you should be relatively well prepared. Besides being able to impress -- or unimpress -- your friends and family with a few new words, you will be able to increase your SAT score rather efficiently since the test writers do heavily favor a relatively small number of obscure vocabulary words.

Where to go from here:

The SAT test's favorite analogy types

SAT analogy practice questions

Back to top