Quest Assessment Part 1: Complete Guide to the Adaptive Computer-Based Test

Quest Assessment Part 1 is the core online admissions test used by over 100 selective independent schools across the UK for Year 7 (11+) entry. It tests four subject areas — English, Mathematics, Non-Verbal Reasoning, and Verbal Reasoning — using a combination of adaptive and non-adaptive questioning. The test is administered and scored by Quest Admissions, and results are reported as age-standardised scores (SAS) that allow schools to compare candidates fairly regardless of when in the year they were born.

This comprehensive guide covers every aspect of Quest Part 1: how each section works, which schools use it, what adaptive testing actually means in practice, how the SAS scoring system operates, and how to build an effective preparation strategy starting in Year 5. We also clarify the important distinction between the online Part 1 used by independent schools and the separate paper-based Quest test used by the Bexley grammar school consortium.

For information on the separate Quest Part 2 (Creative Comprehension and Puzzles and Problem Solving), see our Quest Assessment Part 2 guide. For specialist Quest tuition, visit our Quest Assessment preparation page.

What Is Quest Assessment Part 1?

Quest Assessment is an online admissions platform built specifically for independent school entry in the UK. It provides schools with a flexible, efficient alternative to traditional written entrance papers, allowing them to configure a bespoke online test from a bank of standardised subject modules. Quest Part 1 is the foundational layer of this system, and it is used by the vast majority of schools on the Quest platform.

The four subject modules in Part 1 are: English comprehension (which may include Spelling, Punctuation and Grammar), Mathematics, Non-Verbal Reasoning, and Verbal Reasoning. Schools select which modules to include and how long each section runs. This means that two schools may both describe their entrance assessment as "Quest Part 1" while running slightly different tests. City of London School for Girls, for example, runs a 30-minute adaptive English module that includes SPAG questions, while Forest School uses a shorter 15-minute English section and adds a Puzzles and Problem Solving module from Part 2.

Understanding your target school's specific configuration is therefore one of the first steps in effective preparation. Always check the admissions page of each school your child is targeting, or contact the admissions office directly, before finalising a preparation plan.

The Four Sections of Quest Part 1: Full Breakdown

The table below shows the standard structure of Quest Assessment Part 1. Note that timing and section inclusion vary by school.

Section	Standard Duration	Format	Adaptive?	Key Skills
English	15–30 minutes	Multiple choice	No	Comprehension, vocabulary, inference, SPAG
Mathematics	20 minutes	Multiple choice & free response	Yes	Arithmetic, problem solving, data interpretation
Non-Verbal Reasoning	10 minutes	Multiple choice	Yes	Pattern recognition, spatial reasoning, sequences
Verbal Reasoning	10 minutes	Multiple choice	Yes	Word logic, analogies, codes, letter sequences

English Comprehension: The Non-Adaptive Section in Detail

The English section is the only non-adaptive component of Quest Part 1, which has an important practical implication: children can move backwards and forwards between questions, revisiting any answer they want to change before the time runs out. This freedom of navigation does not exist in the adaptive Maths, NVR, or VR sections, where once an answer is submitted, the next question is generated based on it.

The English section is built around a reading comprehension passage — fiction or non-fiction — that has been written specifically for Quest assessments, ensuring no candidate will have encountered it before. Questions test a range of skills: locating and retrieving explicit information, making inferences and deductions, identifying the writer's purpose and technique, understanding vocabulary in context, and recognising literary devices such as alliteration, metaphor, personification, and simile.

At many schools, a Spelling, Punctuation, and Grammar (SPAG) component is integrated into the English module. This tests verb tense and agreement, parts of speech, synonyms and antonyms, punctuation rules (comma splices, apostrophes, semicolons), and sentence construction. The SPAG questions are presented as standalone multiple-choice items, not embedded within the comprehension passage.

Children who read widely — across both fiction and non-fiction, classic and contemporary — consistently outperform those who have relied solely on comprehension practice booklets. Broad reading builds the contextual vocabulary and inference skills that the harder questions demand. However, timed multiple-choice comprehension practice under online conditions is still essential for building speed and strategy.

The optimal exam technique for the English section is: skim the passage quickly on first read to understand the main theme and structure, answer the questions you can answer immediately, mark any you are uncertain about, then return to uncertain questions with the remaining time. This technique does not apply in the adaptive sections, where pacing must be managed differently.

Mathematics: How the Adaptive Algorithm Works in Practice

The Mathematics section runs for 20 minutes and is adaptive. The platform monitors each response and adjusts question difficulty in real time: a string of correct answers triggers harder questions, while an incorrect answer stabilises difficulty. The section combines multiple-choice questions with free-response items (where children type a numerical answer directly into a field rather than selecting from options).

Topics covered fall within the Key Stage 2 national curriculum through to approximately Year 5 level. These include: number and place value (up to millions, including negative numbers), the four operations with large numbers and decimals, fractions (including equivalent fractions, mixed numbers, and fraction arithmetic), decimals and percentages (including percentage of an amount and percentage change), measurement (length, mass, volume, time, area, perimeter), geometry (properties of 2D and 3D shapes, angle properties, coordinates, symmetry, translation), and data interpretation (bar charts, line graphs, pie charts, frequency tables, mean).

The adaptive nature of the Maths section has a critical implication: a child who has thoroughly understood the material will be directed to harder questions and given the opportunity to demonstrate the full depth of their ability. A child who has drilled practice questions without building genuine understanding will reach their ceiling faster. This is why rote learning and repetitive drilling are significantly less effective than deep concept-building for Quest Maths preparation.

Key topics to prioritise: multi-step word problems requiring two or more operations in sequence, fraction and percentage calculations including converting between forms, angle properties in regular and irregular polygons, compound area and perimeter (involving L-shapes or subtraction), interpreting data from complex charts requiring calculation, and mental arithmetic speed and accuracy for all four operations including long multiplication and short division.

Non-Verbal Reasoning: Pattern Recognition Under Time Pressure

The NVR section runs for 10 minutes and is adaptive. Non-Verbal Reasoning tests a child's ability to identify patterns, continue sequences, and reason about visual and spatial information — skills that are not explicitly taught in the standard primary school curriculum and depend more on reasoning ability than on curriculum knowledge.

The most common NVR question types in Quest Part 1 include: identifying which shape or figure comes next in a sequence; selecting the odd one out from a group of shapes that share a hidden property; identifying which shape is a rotation or reflection of a given figure; finding the code linking a series of shapes and applying it to a new shape; and completing matrices where shapes follow logical rules both horizontally and vertically.

Because NVR is unfamiliar to most children at first, many find it disproportionately stressful. The most effective preparation is structured exposure to each question type with worked examples, allowing children to recognise the category of reasoning each question tests before attempting to answer it. Once a child understands that a rotation question requires tracking which corner or face has moved and by how many degrees, they can work systematically rather than guessing.

Time management is critical: at 10 minutes for approximately 8–12 questions, children have roughly 60–75 seconds per question. Answering the first two or three questions correctly is particularly important in an adaptive section — a poor start routes the child to easier questions for the remainder of the section, reducing the SAS ceiling they can achieve.

Verbal Reasoning: Logic, Word Patterns and Language Systems

The VR section also runs for 10 minutes and is adaptive. Verbal Reasoning differs from English comprehension in that it tests language as a logical system rather than as a vehicle for meaning. Children are asked to spot patterns in words, decode sequences of letters, identify relationships between word pairs, and follow instructions expressed as letter codes.

Common VR question types in Quest Part 1 include: letter and number sequences (identify the rule and state the next item); word analogies (A is to B as C is to ?); find the word that connects two separate pairs; letter codes (a word is transformed by a rule — apply the same rule to a new word); identify hidden words within a continuous string of letters; and sentence completion (choose the word that fits the meaning most precisely).

Children with broad vocabularies tend to find the word-based questions more manageable. The sequence and code questions are more purely logical and improve most reliably with targeted systematic practice. For code questions, the most effective strategy is to treat the problem as a puzzle with a limited set of possible transformations (shift forward by one letter, reverse the word, mirror each letter) and eliminate options methodically rather than guessing the rule from the answers.

As with NVR, early answers in the adaptive VR section are the most consequential. Children who answer the first two or three questions correctly will be directed to significantly harder questions than those who stumble at the start. Pacing must balance speed with accuracy: spending more than 90 seconds on any single question is rarely worthwhile in a 10-minute adaptive section.

Which Schools Use Quest Assessment Part 1 for 11+ Entry?

Quest Admissions is used by over 100 selective independent schools across the UK. The following are among the confirmed Quest-using schools for Year 7 (11+) entry. Always verify directly with each school, as configurations and participation can change year on year.

London and South East: Dulwich College, City of London School for Girls, Forest School (Walthamstow), Whitgift School, Trinity School Croydon, Haberdashers' Boys' School, Haberdashers' Girls' School, Surbiton High School, Chigwell School, Merchant Taylors' School Northwood, Putney High School, Croydon High School, Royal Russell School, Notre Dame School, Wetherby Senior School, and all 14 schools in the London Girls' Consortium.

National: The Perse School Cambridge (see our Perse School 11+ guide), Cheltenham Ladies' College, Oxford High School GDST, Norwich High School for Girls, Norwich School, Sherborne Girls, St Albans School, Bishop's Stortford College, King's Ely, Magdalen College School Oxford, Abingdon School, and many others. See also our Dulwich College 11+ preparation guide for that school's specific Quest format and written English paper.

Note that all the schools above are fee-paying independent schools. State grammar schools use different assessment providers (typically GL Assessment or CEM). The one notable exception is the Bexley consortium, which uses a paper-based Quest test — see our Bexley Quest Assessment guide for full details.

How Quest Part 1 Scoring Works: Age Standardisation Explained

All Quest Part 1 answers are marked automatically by the platform's algorithm. The raw score for each section is then converted into a Standardised Age Score (SAS) using the child's exact age in years and months at the time they sat the test.

Here is how age standardisation works: two children who both answer 90% of questions correctly may receive different SAS scores if one was born in September (older, Year 6 cohort) and the other was born in June (younger, nearly a year's difference). The June-born child's SAS will be slightly higher, because achieving the same raw score at a younger age represents proportionally stronger performance. An SAS of 100 represents average performance for a child of that exact age; scores above 100 represent above-average performance.

For adaptive sections, the SAS also accounts for the difficulty of the questions the child was routed to — so a child who was directed to harder questions (having answered early questions correctly) is rewarded for that difficulty in their final score, even if they answered some of the harder questions incorrectly.

Schools do not publish the SAS thresholds they use for shortlisting. Based on experience supporting hundreds of candidates, Leading Tuition's specialist tutors observe that competitive SAS scores at the most selective Quest-using schools (Dulwich, CLS Girls, The Perse, Habs Boys, Habs Girls) typically fall in the range of 115–130+. Less selective Quest schools may shortlist candidates from around 105–110 SAS upwards. These are indicative figures, not official ones.

Quest Part 1 vs GL Assessment vs ISEB Common Pre-Test

Families new to selective admissions frequently encounter all three of these systems at once. The key differences are as follows.

Quest Part 1 vs GL Assessment: GL Assessment produces the most widely used 11+ test papers for state grammar school selection across Kent, Buckinghamshire, Hertfordshire, parts of London, and many other areas. GL papers are paper-based, fixed-difficulty (all candidates see the same questions), and typically administered at a test centre in the autumn of Year 6. Quest is entirely online, includes adaptive sections, and is used primarily by fee-paying independent schools. A child preparing for Quest who also has GL Assessment grammar school tests should practise both paper-based and online formats, as the experience of sitting each test differs significantly.

Quest Part 1 vs ISEB Common Pre-Test: The ISEB Common Pre-Test is used for 13+ entry to leading independent boarding and day schools — children sit it in Year 6, but for Year 9 entry two years later. Quest Part 1 is for 11+ entry (Year 7). Both are adaptive, computer-based tests covering English, Maths, VR, and NVR, and a child preparing for both simultaneously (a common situation for families targeting both Year 7 and Year 9 at different schools) can integrate much of their preparation. For a detailed comparison, see our Quest vs ISEB guide.

Building an Effective Quest Part 1 Preparation Strategy

Effective Quest Part 1 preparation is different from standard 11+ practice in several important ways.

Prioritise online practice from the start. Because Quest is entirely computer-based, your child must be comfortable with the online format — reading questions on screen, typing numerical answers, clicking to select options, and managing time without the ability to write working in a margin. Paper-based preparation is useful for building subject knowledge, but the final 4–6 months of preparation should be primarily online and timed. Children who have only practised on paper often find the first time they sit an online test disorienting, and that disorientation costs time and accuracy.

Start early and build depth, not speed. The adaptive algorithm will expose any ceiling in your child's preparation quickly. A child who has thoroughly understood a topic will be routed to harder questions and have the opportunity to demonstrate their full ability range. A child who has only surface familiarity will reach their ceiling within two or three questions. The recommended timeline is to begin structured preparation no later than September of Year 5, giving 12–14 months before tests typically held in October or November of Year 6.

Know your target school's exact format. Check whether your school uses a 15-minute or 30-minute English section, whether they include SPAG questions, whether they add Puzzles and Problem Solving or a school-set written English paper. Building preparation around the actual format is more efficient than preparing for every possible Quest configuration.

Teach section-specific exam strategy. In the non-adaptive English section, children should mark and return to uncertain questions. In the adaptive Maths, NVR, and VR sections, they should prioritise accuracy over speed in early questions (since early answers are the most consequential for the difficulty routing), then maintain a steady pace for the remainder. Full mock tests under timed conditions — ideally one per month from January of Year 6 — build the stamina and pacing instinct children need on test day.

Frequently Asked Questions About Quest Assessment Part 1