PwC online assessment format: what candidates reported

PwC does not publish the format of its early careers cognitive test, but graduate applicants in the 2025/26 cycle described it consistently on The Student Room: SHL's interactive question style rather than multiple choice, with several reporting 8 questions in 12 minutes. This page sets out what was reported, how reliable each piece is, and what is still unknown.

What PwC itself says

PwC UK's early careers page says the online assessment is hosted on the SHL platform and contains an untimed behavioural profile followed by a timed cognitive test covering numerical, inductive and deductive reasoning. It gives no question count, no time limit and no format. PwC's candidate e-learn shows multiple-choice sample questions, but warns that the content will be slightly different to the actual tests.

What 2025/26 graduate candidates reported

In the Student Room thread for PwC's 2026 graduate scheme, posts from October and November 2025 describe the test in detail. The posters were applying to Advisory and Consulting, Audit, and Tech and AI.

• Format: asked whether it was the interactive version or multiple choice, a candidate who had sat it answered that it was interactive.
• Question kinds: calendars and scheduling, pie charts, sequences and patterns, and rankings. One candidate compared it to the SHL test another large employer uses.
• Length: several candidates across different streams reported 8 questions in 12 minutes. One said length may depend on the stream, because a friend had more.
• Navigation: one candidate noted that you could not go back to a question.
• Behavioural part: a long section asking which statement is most like you, which matches the forced-choice examples in PwC's own e-learn.
• Preparation: one successful candidate's advice was to practise SHL's general ability test, because PwC's questions were just like it.

How reliable is this?

First-hand reports are not official confirmation. They come from one cycle, mostly from graduate scheme applicants, and people misremember. But several independent posters agreeing on the same details is far stronger than a preparation site asserting a number with no source.

What is still unknown

• Anything about the 2026/27 cycle. No reports exist yet, and employers do change formats between years.
• School leaver, Flying Start, apprenticeship and internship routes. Candidates confirm SHL is used, but nobody describes the questions.
• Which SHL product it is. SHL sells both an interactive general ability test and a multiple-choice one covering the same three abilities, and PwC names neither.
• Pass marks. Nobody outside PwC knows them.

What this means for your preparation

Eight questions in twelve minutes is 90 seconds each, and candidates said single questions could take several minutes if you met the type cold. The preparation that follows is specific: learn the interactive question types until the mechanics cost you nothing, then practise at 90 seconds a question so the pace feels normal.

The tests on this site are interactive and run at that same pace, 24 questions in 36 minutes. That length is ours, not PwC's: think of one of our tests as three sittings' worth of practice at the reported speed.

Sources: PwC UK early careers assessment and selection page, checked 20 September 2026; PwC UK candidate e-learn; The Student Room, PwC 2026 Grad Scheme thread, posts from October and November 2025; SHL's published fact sheets for its general ability tests.