UK Graduate Aptitude Tests: The Complete 2026/27 Guide

This page is the map. Each provider has its own guide below, and each guide answers one question properly rather than several vaguely. If you already know which test you are sitting, skip straight to it. If you do not, read the invitation email first — it is the only reliable source, because employers change providers by role, by division and by year.

Which aptitude test will a UK employer actually send you?

Four providers account for most of what UK finance, consulting and Big 4 applicants meet. What follows is the short version of each, with a link to the guide that covers it in full.

• SHL — the Verify range. Verify G+ is 30 questions in an allowed 36 minutes on SHL’s own fact sheet; Verify Interactive Numerical is reported by preparation providers at 10 questions in 18 minutes, and the multiple-choice Verify Numerical Ability at 16–18 questions in about 20 minutes. SHL publishes neither.
• Aon (cut-e) — the scales family. The full-length numerical test is 37 tasks in 12 minutes, about 20 seconds each, worked across multiple data tabs.
• Cappfinity — strengths-based assessments wrapped in a workplace scenario. Usually untimed, but your completion time is recorded.
• Arctic Shores — task-based assessment. A sequence of short interactive tasks measuring behaviour alongside cognitive ability. There is no overall time limit and Arctic Shores publishes no duration; one preparation guide suggests allowing 75 to 85 minutes for the full suite.

Every timing and question count above comes from the provider-specific guide it links to, carrying the same confidence label it has there. Confirmed means the publisher states it; Reported means preparation providers and candidate reports agree but the publisher does not say. Not published No employer publishes which provider it will use in a given year, and none publishes a cut-off score. Confirm from your invitation email.

If you want the four side by side on a single row-by-row table — questions, time, negative marking, scoring, calculator policy, each value labelled by how well it is sourced — see SHL vs Aon vs Cappfinity vs Arctic Shores compared.

The guides, one question each

SHL Tests in 2026: What UK Finance and Consulting Applicants Actually Face

The Verify range in detail — Verify G+ (30 questions, 36 minutes, from SHL’s fact sheet), Verify Interactive Numerical, Verify Numerical Ability and Verify Verbal — plus how norm-group scoring turns your raw score into a percentile.

The Aon (cut-e) Scales Numerical Test: Why It’s Nothing Like SHL

37 tasks in 12 minutes, worked across multiple data tabs, with wrong answers carrying a deduction that Aon publishes itself. The one major UK test where guessing costs you, and why SHL habits backfire on it.

Cappfinity Assessments Explained: The Provider Behind HSBC, Barclays and KPMG

Strengths-based, scenario-wrapped and usually untimed — but your completion time is recorded. What HSBC, Barclays and KPMG each send, and how to prepare for a test with no answer key.

Arctic Shores Game-Based Assessment: What You Can (and Can’t) Prepare For

Half an hour of short interactive tasks measuring behaviour and cognitive ability. An honest split of what preparation genuinely moves and what it cannot touch.

Aptitude Test Scores Explained: Percentiles, Norm Groups and What Banks Actually Require

Why your raw score is not your result, how the employer’s choice of norm group changes everything, and what the industry estimates actually say about bank cut-offs.

When to Start Preparing for Aptitude Tests: A Timeline for 2026/27 UK Applications

A month-by-month plan anchored to real 2026/27 dates: when banks open, when schemes fill, how fast the invitation arrives, and what to do if you are joining late.

Which Test Will They Send You? The 2026/27 Provider Map for UK Finance Applicants

Which employer uses which provider, with every mapping labelled confirmed, reported or not published — and the thirty-second method that settles it for your own application.

Are Calculators Allowed in Aptitude Tests? The Answer for Every Major UK Format

The format-by-format answer, and the more useful point underneath it: why the calculator is almost never the thing that decides your score.

What every one of these tests has in common

Three things are true across all four providers, and they matter more than the differences.

The score is relative, not absolute. Your raw score is ranked against a norm group the employer picks, and reported as a percentile. There is no percentage of questions you must get right. The same performance can be excellent against one comparison pool and ordinary against another.

The maths is not the hard part. The arithmetic across all of these tests sits at or below GCSE level. What is being measured is speed and accuracy under pressure, on unfamiliar data, with a clock running.

Practising the wrong format wastes the time you have. Preparation for SHL transfers poorly to Aon and barely at all to Arctic Shores. Read the invitation email before you practise anything.

Where to start

Whichever provider you are facing, the first useful step is the same and almost nobody takes it: find out where you currently stand, once, under real conditions, before you spend hours drilling.

Before you start preparing, find out where you actually stand. The Acumen Logic Benchmark is a free, one-shot diagnostic — 20 questions under real timed conditions, taken once, like the real thing. You get a percentile, a per-section breakdown, and a clear answer to the only question that decides how you should prepare.