Whether you’re taking the ACT or SAT, it’s important to be aware of the timing of the exam. Now, if you know me, you know my #1 tip is to focus on accuracy over speed; however, you still need to have a sense of your pacing in order to ensure you’re answering enough questions to hit your target score before your time is up.

You don’t want to simply hope that the room you’re testing in will have a clock you can use. Even if you luck out and it does have a clock, your proctor may be using a different clock for timing which can turn keeping track of your pacing into a nightmare.

Thus, this simple timing hack was born!

There are a lot of factors that are out of your control on test day, but this tip can help you take back control over one headache so you can focus your attention where it belongs: on the questions you’re trying to answer!