← All medical school resources
ADMISSIONS TESTS
MCAT (Medical College Admission Test)
The standardised admissions test for US and Canadian medical schools, administered by the AAMC.
The Medical College Admission Test is the standardised, multiple-choice examination required for admission to almost all medical schools in the United States and Canada. It is developed and administered by the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC).
The current MCAT, in use since 2015, runs for around seven and a half hours and comprises four scored sections: Biological and Biochemical Foundations of Living Systems; Chemical and Physical Foundations of Biological Systems; Psychological, Social, and Biological Foundations of Behavior; and Critical Analysis and Reasoning Skills (CARS). Each section is scored between 118 and 132 with a midpoint of 125; total scores range from 472 to 528.
Most US medical schools report median MCAT scores around 511–514 for matriculants, but the test is one part of a holistic review that also considers GPA, research and clinical experience, recommendation letters, and the personal statement. International applicants face additional considerations including limited seats and visa requirements.
Current authoritative resources
About this page
This page is one of a set of medical school and medical careers resources on chrispaton.org, replacing the category landings of New Media Medicine (newmediamedicine.com), an early digital health blog and UK medical school applications community I ran between 2004 and 2014. The original New Media Medicine forum threads — user-generated content from that community — are not republished here; this is original framing written to help current applicants find authoritative information. Always confirm details with the official sources linked above before acting on them.