A 326 is comfortably competitive almost everywhere. Whether it is competitive at your specific programme depends on which half of it is doing the work.
A 326 is comfortably competitive nearly everywhere, and the remaining risk in your application is not the number. It is whether the half of it your programme actually cares about is the strong half.
Yes. A 326 is above the average admitted score in all 8 fields ETS reports, and a balanced split puts you around the 91th percentile on Verbal and the 60th on Quant.
Every field ETS reports sits below a 326 — the highest of them, Physical Sciences, averages 314. There is no discipline where this total reads as weak.
The averages tell you where the middle of a discipline sits, which is useful right up to the point you pick specific departments. After that, only their published numbers matter.
Nobody at a graduate department opens your report and looks for 326. They look for the section their programme cares about, and that number is not visible from the total.
Run through the ways of assembling a 326 and the section percentiles swing from the 39th to the 99th. A committee sees where you actually landed in that swing; the total does not.
Take the even split, 163 and 163. Same number twice, 91th percentile on one section and 60th on the other. Anyone comparing their two scaled scores directly is comparing different rulers.
Probably not. A 326 is above every published field average, and ETS shows programmes your full score history under ScoreSelect unless you choose otherwise. Retaking to move a number that is already doing its job is a poor trade.
Check for one thing before deciding: a weak section in the discipline you are applying to. That is the only version of this that justifies another sitting.
A total hides the two numbers programmes read. Run your Verbal and Quant through the GRE percentile calculator to see the published percentile for each, then compare those against your field rather than comparing 326 against a rule of thumb.
Check your section percentilesLook up the average Verbal and Quant for your specific field rather than the total. A 326 is competitive on paper; the section your programme reads is what makes it competitive in practice.
Many combinations, and they are not equivalent: 156V/170Q and 170V/156Q both total 326 but read very differently.
Only for a lopsided split. If the half your discipline cares about lags its field average, retake that section's preparation rather than the whole test.
The reported engineering average is 313, so a 326 is above it — but those programmes read Quant closely, so check that half against the 163 field average.
The total is mostly an administrative convenience. What varies — and what gets read — is the section score, which at a 326 can sit anywhere from the 39th to the 99th percentile.