PwC tests numerical and inductive reasoning on SHL. Here is what that asks of you

PwC UK says its timed cognitive test covers numerical, inductive and deductive reasoning, on the SHL platform. Our reasoning test trains the numerical side with business tables and the deductive side through its True, False or Cannot say passages.

Inductive reasoning, spotting the rule in a pattern of shapes, is not in our reasoning test. The CCAT practice test has shape sequences and is the nearer rehearsal. PwC also sets a behavioural assessment and a recorded video interview, which no timed test can prepare you for.

PwC's UK early careers page describes the online stage in a clear order. You complete a behavioural assessment, then a cognitive test, and if you progress you record a video interview, all on the SHL platform. The behavioural assessment is untimed; the cognitive assessment is timed.

The sequence matters for how you spend your preparation. The behavioural test is about consistency and honesty, and most of your reasoning-test practice will be wasted on it. The cognitive test is the one with a clock, and that is the part a free practice test can improve.

PwC lists numerical, inductive and deductive reasoning. They are different skills.

• Numerical reasoning: answering from tables and charts. This is the first half of the practice test above.
• Deductive reasoning: working out what must follow from the information given. The True, False or Cannot say passages in the second half of the practice test train exactly this habit of answering only from what is supplied.
• Inductive reasoning: spotting the rule behind a pattern, usually of shapes, and choosing what comes next. Our reasoning test does not include it. The CCAT practice test has shape sequences and is the nearest free rehearsal.

People who are fluent with tables are often caught out by pattern questions, because there is no text to anchor on. The method is to ask the same short list of questions of every pattern: does a shape move, rotate or change colour, do the quantities add or subtract each step, does anything alternate. Most items fall to one of those within 20 seconds.

PwC's own Employability Hub names inductive reasoning among the most relevant tests and offers practice. Use that for the interface and for items in the platform's own style. Use ours for the clock.

We cannot show you the SHL interface, the exact layout of a PwC question or how the timer is displayed. The Employability Hub can, and PwC links to it for that reason. A sensible split is to do your first full attempt here, learn which half costs you, and then do the matching practice in the hub so the screen is familiar on the day.

Do not treat any third-party site as PwC's question bank. Prep companies describe the format; nobody outside PwC and SHL knows what you will be shown.

Passing the cognitive test leads to an on-demand video interview, again on the SHL platform. Your answers are recorded and an assessor reviews them later. That removes the usual interviewer cues, so practise the awkward part: talking to a camera with no feedback.

Record yourself answering one question in a quiet room. Watch it once, fix the single biggest distraction, and record it again. It takes ten minutes and it helps more than reading another list of sample questions.

PwC does not publish question counts, minute limits or pass marks on the pages we read. Prep sites do, and they disagree. One puts numerical at 12 to 18 questions in 17 to 25 minutes; another gives a longer verbal section. We have left the numbers out of the table rather than pick one.

The simplest way to learn your timing is the practice test in the platform. If it tells you a time limit, believe that over anything written here.

These come from anonymous reviews, university careers pages and prep guides. They often disagree, and PwC has not confirmed them. Read them as leads, not rules.

• Prep sites report that PwC's numerical test has about 12 to 18 questions with 17 to 25 minutes, built around charts, tables and figures. PwC does not confirm this.
• One prep guide says candidates typically get five to seven days to complete the assessment from when the link is sent. Your invitation shows your real deadline.
• A university careers blog describes a PwC balloon game that places candidates on a scale of risk-taking. We could not tie it to the current UK process.
• TargetJobs lists PwC among graduate employers that set verbal reasoning tests, which does not match PwC UK's own list of numerical, inductive and deductive reasoning. Check your invitation.