GRE® to LSAT® Score Conversion: How It Works (And Why You Should Be Skeptical)

The folks who run the GRE® have developed a nifty comparison tool to convert your GRE® score into an LSAT® score.

However, questions remain about whether this tool is accurate and valuable. After all, the LSAT® and the GRE® are very different from one another, and this makes it difficult to cleanly compare the two tests.

Additionally, law school admissions committees do not look at the tests in the same light. The LSAT® remains the gold standard for predicting student success in law school, while the GRE® opens the door for a more diverse and interesting pool of applicants. This disparity complicates the attempt to accurately convert a GRE® score to an LSAT® score or vice versa.

Read below for more information on the comparison tool and some other ways to think about LSAT® to GRE® score conversions.

The GRE®-LSAT® Comparison Tool

As the GRE® made its push for acceptance in the law school world, it published a handy little LSAT®-GRE® comparison tool, so that you can take any GRE® score and turn it into an “equivalent” LSAT® score. Sounds great, right?

Trouble is, conversion charts that compare two different tests are on shaky scientific ground. The GRE® and the LSAT® are designed to measure different skills, most notably, quant is a huge part of the GRE®, but doesn’t show up at all on the LSAT®. Few, if any, independent psychometricians (experts in the statistical science underneath standardized testing) would suggest that these conversion charts should ever be used. They simply aren’t very accurate, even under the best of conditions.

The LSAT®-GRE® comparison tool was, of course, published by the creators of the GRE®, who have made an aggressive attempt to seize market share from the LSAT®. Please keep that in mind as you assess the validity of the tool.

To create the tool, the creators of the GRE® studied a population of 1,587 students who took both tests, and then used these students’ GRE® scores to “predict” an LSAT® score. There are some major flaws with this approach: for example, are these students “typical” test-takers, or are they a skewed or self-selected population in some way?

Additionally, if you’re trying to convert GRE® scores into LSAT® scores, the standard error of prediction is +/- 5 points. In other words: if law school programs try to use your GRE® score to predict what you would have scored if you’d taken the LSAT® instead, the conversion chart is likely to be off by an average of 5 points in one direction or another.

And in case you’re new to the (often painful) reality of law school admissions: 5 points on the LSAT® is a really, really big deal these days. For context, that’s roughly the difference between the median LSAT® score at a top-5 law school and the median score at a law school ranked in the 20s.

So if law school admissions committees use the LSAT®-GRE® comparison tool… well, they probably shouldn’t.

Other Ways to Compare GRE® and LSAT® Scores

Let’s take a step back for a moment. Law schools care about standardized test scores for two main reasons: first, they want to make sure that you can handle graduate-level legal coursework and successfully complete your law degree. Second, they want to rank as high as possible in the rankings, and LSAT® scores still play a significant role in many rankings schemes.

Law school rankings have encouraged an “arms race” of ever-increasing LSAT® scores, and they incentivize admissions committees to prioritize LSAT® scores over other factors, such as unique work experience or a fascinating statement of purpose.

Accepting the GRE® is a way for admissions committees to sidestep this arms race and admit interesting candidates who lack a ridiculously high LSAT® score.

So, what is a “good” GRE® score for these interesting candidates? Because so few students are admitted with GRE® scores, it’s hard to know for sure.

We do know this, however: to succeed at a top law school, you’ll need strong verbal skills, and law schools take the GRE® verbal section far more seriously than the quantitative section. We also know that human beings respond to round numbers, and 160 seems to be an absolute minimum for admission to top-25 law school programs.

Obviously, you should always shoot for the best GRE® verbal score possible if you’re targeting elite law school programs. But at the very least, a 160 seems to be a bare minimum if you’re hoping for admission to top programs.

In theory, the quantitative portion of the GRE® shouldn’t be as important to law schools. However, it’s still important to scrape together a decent overall score, so you should also shoot for a minimum GRE® quant score of 160.

For top 20 law schools, the median composite GRE® score for accepted students runs from 319 to 332. So, a pair of 160’s (for a composite score of 320) on the GRE® wouldn’t put you in a great position for Yale or Harvard, but would be decent for USC or Boston University, for example.

To edge closer to that 332 composite score on the GRE®, you’ll want to pick up points wherever you can, but know that schools will place a higher value on top verbal marks than they will on top quant marks. A 165V/160Q is probably looked at more favorably than a 160V/165Q, even if the composite score is exactly the same.

Should You Take the GRE® Instead of the LSAT®?

The reality is that the GRE® is a newcomer to the law school admissions game, and nobody really knows exactly what a “good enough” GRE® score is yet. So what should you do if you’re not sure whether to take the LSAT® or the GRE®? Here’s our advice:

• Stick with the LSAT® if you can score at or above the median for your target law school program.
• Consider the GRE® if you’re an interesting candidate who can’t seem to crush the LSAT®.
• If you take the GRE®, shoot for a bare minimum of 160V/160Q, but understand that this is probably not enough for the most elite law school programs.

For the fuller decision framework, see Do Law Schools Prefer the LSAT® or GRE®?