Set each of your four MCAT section scores to see your total on the 472–528 scale and the percentile rank it corresponds to. Every section is weighted equally, so this is also the quickest way to see what lifting one weak section would do to your total.
Test Ninjas Research · Updated September 11, 2026
125 / 132
Chemical and Physical Foundations of Biological Systems
125 / 132
Critical Analysis and Reasoning Skills
125 / 132
Biological and Biochemical Foundations of Living Systems
125 / 132
Psychological, Social, and Biological Foundations of Behavior
Total Score
500
of 472–528
Percentile
48%
Around the middle
Percentiles effective May 1, 2026
Percentile ranks are approximate. The AAMC recalculates them annually from a pooled sample of recent test takers and publishes the current table effective May 1.
How MCAT scoring works
The MCAT returns five numbers: one score for each of the four sections, and a total. Each section is scored from 118 to 132, and the four section scores add together into a total from 472 to 528. There is no weighting and no composite formula beyond that sum — a point is a point wherever you earn it.
The scale is centred so that a total of 500 sits near the middle of all test takers, and each section is centred at 125. Scores are scaled rather than raw, which means the 230 questions you answered are converted onto a common scale that accounts for small differences in difficulty between test forms. This is why the AAMC does not publish raw-to-scaled conversion charts: the conversion is specific to the form you sat.
MCAT structure at a glance
Section
Questions
Time
Score range
Chem/Phys
59
95 min
118–132
CARS
53
90 min
118–132
Bio/Biochem
59
95 min
118–132
Psych/Soc
59
95 min
118–132
There is no penalty for a wrong answer. Answer all 230 questions, including the ones you are purely guessing on — a blank can only cost you points.
What each total is worth
Because the distribution is tightly clustered around 500, small movements in the middle of the scale change your percentile a lot, and movements at the top change it very little. Going from 500 to 505 moves you roughly 16 percentile points; going from 520 to 525 moves you about 3.
Total score to percentile rank (effective May 1, 2026)
The most useful thing this calculator does is show you the cost of an uneven profile. Two students with the same total can have very different paths to improving it: a 508 built from 127/127/127/127 has no obvious weak point to attack, while a 508 built from 130/122/130/126 has fourteen points of headroom sitting in one section. Drag CARS from 122 to 126 above and watch what happens to the total.
Applying with the GRE instead?
A growing number of medical and health-science programs accept the GRE. Our GRE course covers Verbal and Quant in full, with adaptive practice tests and instant scoring.
Your MCAT total is simply the sum of your four section scores. Each section — Chem/Phys, CARS, Bio/Biochem, and Psych/Soc — is scored from 118 to 132, so the total runs from 472 to 528. All four sections are weighted equally, which means a point gained in CARS moves your total exactly as much as a point gained in Bio/Biochem.
The scale is centred so that 500 sits near the middle of all test takers, which corresponds to roughly the 50th percentile. Students who go on to matriculate at U.S. MD programs average noticeably higher than that — about 512 — because the applicant pool that reaches matriculation is self-selected.
No. The AAMC recalculates percentile ranks each year from a pooled sample of recent test takers and publishes the updated table effective May 1. The scaled scores themselves stay comparable across years, but the percentile attached to a given total can shift by a point or two. Treat any percentile as a close guide rather than a fixed value.
Not reliably. The AAMC does not publish raw-to-scaled conversion tables for the MCAT, and the conversion is adjusted for each individual form so that scores mean the same thing regardless of which version you sat. That is why this calculator works from section scores rather than raw correct counts.
No. There is no penalty for an incorrect answer, so you should answer every one of the 230 questions even when you are guessing. Leaving a question blank can only cost you points.
Each section spans 15 possible scores (118 to 132), so a single section can swing your total by up to 14 points on its own. In practice, moving one weak section from 125 to 128 lifts a 500 to a 503 — which is often the difference between two quite different percentile bands.