Gifted & Talented
Free CogAT Grade 8 Practice Test 2026
Cognitive Abilities Test — Grade 8 (Level 13/14)
134
Questions
9
Topics
Percentile-based — each district sets its own cutoff
Passing Score
60m
Time Limit
Practice by topic
All Topics
What the CogAT Grade 8 test is
Eighth graders usually sit CogAT Level 13/14, the same form seventh graders take. Because the items are shared across the two grades, the practical target for an eighth grader is not harder reasoning but faster reasoning: the same questions, scored against an older age group, which means the same performance places lower than it would have a year earlier. At this age the score most often feeds into high school placement, honours or accelerated tracks, or admission to selective programmes.
How the Level 13/14 test is structured
Level 13/14 has about 176 questions across nine subtests, three in each of the three batteries, individually timed at around ten minutes each for roughly ninety minutes of testing. This is the most demanding form most students will encounter before the levels used in high school, particularly in the Nonverbal battery, where paper folding items combine three folds with two punches.
What this site covers for grade 8
134 original questions for grade 8, covering the batteries listed below. The rest are still being written, and rather than pad the gap this page names it — a practice set that quietly leaves out whole batteries would tell you something misleading about your child.
Still being written: Verbal Analogies, Sentence Completion, Verbal Classification.
Still being written: Number Analogies, Number Series, Number Puzzles.
Ready: Figure Matrices, Figure Classification, Paper Folding.
What the scores mean
A Standard Age Score, an age percentile rank, a stanine, and an Ability Profile describing the shape of the three batteries. The age-in-months norm is the reason an eighth grader and a seventh grader with identical answers receive different percentiles. What counts as a qualifying score depends on the programme the score is being used for rather than on any national standard.
There is more detail on how the numbers relate to each other in the CogAT score guide, and on reading the score shape in the ability profile guide.
How to prepare for grade 8
Since the form is shared with grade 7, additional technique has less to offer an eighth grader than additional speed. If accuracy is already good, the remaining marks are almost entirely in deciding faster and in abandoning items that are not resolving - classification items resolve quickly or not at all, and that is where the time for paper folding should come from. Timed practice is worth more than untimed at this level, and short sets are worth more than long ones.
Common questions about the CogAT in grade 8
Does taking the same form as grade 7 make the test easier?
No - it makes it harder in effect. The questions are identical but the comparison group is a year older, so the same raw score yields a lower percentile than it would have in grade 7.
Is it too late for practice to help?
Practice still closes the familiarity gap, which is real for any student who has not met these formats recently. What it does not do is raise underlying ability, and at this level most of the honest gain is in pacing rather than in reasoning.
How is the CogAT used in eighth grade?
Most often for high school placement - honours or accelerated tracks - or for admission to selective programmes. Some districts use it alongside achievement tests and grades rather than as a standalone measure.