How GMAT Opens Doors to Graduate Business Education

When applying to most business schools, candidates face a strategic decision: which test to take. Since its launch in 1954, the GMAT exam has been the gold standard in graduate business education admission.

- By Gaurav Srivastava, regional director, APAC, Middle East & Africa, GMAC

Unlike the GRE, the GMAT exam was designed specifically for graduate management education with great input by business school admission professionals themselves. Studies after studies have given proof to why the GMAT remains the exam most closely aligned with the sought-after skills, academic rigor, and expectations of graduate management education.

Competitive Advantage in Admissions

Business schools report higher confidence in evaluating GMAT scores because many admissions officers know that submitting a GMAT score signals a commitment to management education, a practice often used to distinguish candidates in competitive pools. Furthermore, a predictive validity study over time has demonstrated that when used in combination with undergraduate GPA, the GMAT score is a better indicator of academic success than UGPA alone. There is little doubt that the GMAT has been a highly relevant indicator of candidate success for graduate business degree programs and therefore has remained a key element of business school admission's holistic approach.

The competitive advantage over GRE has solidified GMAT as the admissions exam of choice at the world's top business schools. At the top 10 business schools in the United States, for example, the GMAT exam was taken by the majority of applicants, according to the 2025 U.S. News & World Report rankings, and taken by most students getting into schools such as Harvard Business School (63%), Wharton School (64%), and Kellogg School of Management (67%).

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