The LSAT Curve Myth: Why Your Test Date Doesn't Matter

Every testing cycle, someone tells me they're skipping a test date because "the smart people take that one." If the LSAT were curved, they'd have a point. It isn't. The people in the room with you have zero effect on your score, and picking a date to dodge them just costs you prep time.

What LSAC says about the curve

LSAC's psychometric research team put it plainly in a reply to a test-taker: "the LSAT is not graded to a curve." What LSAC does instead is called test equating. Each version of the test (LSAC calls it a "form") gets its own conversion table, which turns your raw score (the number you got right) into a score from 120 to 180. The table adjusts for small differences in difficulty between forms, so a 165 means the same level of skill no matter which test you took or who took it with you.

What equating looks like on today's test

The current LSAT has 3 scored sections (2 Logical Reasoning, 1 Reading Comprehension), about 75 to 77 scored questions in total. Here's what the April 2025 conversion table looked like. That test had 77 scored questions:

180: 76 right (miss 1)
170: 69 right (miss 8)
165: 63 right (miss 14)
160: 56 right (miss 21)

On a slightly harder form, the table gets a bit more generous and you can miss 1 or 2 more for the same score. On an easier form, it gets stingier. That's equating doing its job. It isn't a curve, because the table doesn't care how anyone else did that day. For every score on every recent test, see the LSAT raw score conversion chart.

How LSAC knows how hard a test is

This is where the experimental section comes in. Every new question gets tried out on real test-takers in an unscored section before it ever counts. By the time a question shows up in a scored section, LSAC already knows roughly how many people get it right. Build a test out of questions with known difficulty and you can set the conversion table with real precision. LSAC uses a statistical method called item response theory to do it. Skip the math. What matters for you is that your score doesn't depend on your neighbors.

Why LSAC can't just reuse one test

The lazy way to make every score fair would be to give the same test every time. It would last about one cycle. Test-takers talk, questions leak, and anyone who tested later would walk in with an advantage. So LSAC writes new forms for every administration and uses equating to keep them comparable.

Percentiles are a different thing

Here's where the curve myth comes from. Your score report also shows a percentile, the share of test-takers who scored below you. That number does compare you to other people, but it's calculated across several recent testing years, not just your test day. It never changes your 120 to 180 score. Law schools report and compare the score, so that's the number to care about.

What this means for you

Pick your test date based on when you'll be ready, not on rumors about "easy" months or tough crowds. There's no such thing as an easy curve to wait for. The only lever you control is how many questions you get right, and that comes down to how well you prep.

Want the whole test on one page? Grab the free LSAT cheat sheet.

Related: the raw score conversion chart for every LSAT PrepTest, so you can see equating in practice.

I've written free explanations for every question in LSAT PrepTest 159, 158, 157, 156, 155 and 154, with the right answer and why each wrong answer fails. All LSAT explanations are here.

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