Fast Quants tricks

Since the last two years, on screen calculators have been provided in CAT. But there are other entrances where you are expected to do calculations on your own.If you go about it, a problem that’s going to require half a page of calculations,well, you are not going to want to do that problem. But on the Quant section of all the entrances other than CAT, you don’t get a calculator, so how can you still get a 99th percentile score? Here are some shortcuts that might help you out! Shortcut#1 For instance, what is 5/12 of 81 .Then multiply that result by 240. 81 isn’t divisible by 12 but the two numbers do share 3 as a factor, so you can at least simplify a bit and then you will need to do some longhand multiplication and division… Here’s the full math that is asked : 5/12 x 81/1 x 240/1 That 81 can’t completely cancel out the 12 but the 240 can! Check it out: 5/12 x 81/1 x 240/1 = 5/1 x 81/1 x 20/1 Now,5 times 81. When multiplying a string of numbers, always look to pair 5’s and 2’s first. 5’s and 2’s create 10’s (or multiples of) and those are a whole lot easier to multiply into the rest of the numbers. (5)(20) = 100 (100)(81) = 8,100 Shortcut #2: When multiplying a string of numbers, pair off the 5’s and 2’s and multiply them first.Let’s say that that problem hadn’t had a 20 in it. If we had to multiply 5 and 81.There are various shortcuts for multiplication, but here’s one specifically for multiplying by 5: Take the non-5 number (in this case, 81) and halve it: 81 → 40.5 Move the decimal one place to the right: 40.5 → 405 Try it again: what is 5 × 37? The number 36 divided by 2 is 18, so 37 divided by 2 must be 18.5.Finally, move the decimal one place to the right: 18.5 becomes 185. Shortcut #3: If division involves an annoying number, start from a nearby easier number and then work to the annoying number from there. Shortcut #4: To multiply by 5, first halve the other number, then make it bigger again by moving the decimal one place to the right. What if you need to divide by 5 instead? Let’s do 81 / 5: Take the non-5 number (in this case, 81) and double it: 81 → 162 Move the decimal one place to the left: 162 → 16.2 Try it again: what is 896 / 5? 900 × 2 = 1,800, so 896 is 8 less than that, or 1,792. Then, move the decimal one place to the left to make the number smaller: 1,792 → 179.2. Shortcut #5: To divide by 5, first double the other number, then make it smaller again by moving the decimal one place to the left. Shortcut #6: Use benchmarks to find percents. Some  problems appear to involve tedious percent calculations, but they’re really not all that tedious if you take a step back and use benchmarks.What are benchmarks? First, let’s start with a number—say, 140. Now, let’s say that the problem calls for 18% of 140.e benchmarks instead: The starting number, 140, is 100%. 10% of 140 is 14. Therefore, 20% is twice that, or 28. We’re trying to get to 18%, which is 2% less then 20%. We already know that 20% = 28. Therefore, 2% = 2.8. 20% − 2% = 18%, so 28 − 2.8 = 25.2. The answer is 25.2 Any percentage can be calculated using some combination of “benchmark” percentages that are easier to find. The easiest-to-find benchmarks are 100%, 50%, 10%, and 1%. From 50%, you can move the decimal left once to get 5%. Using these 5 benchmarks, you can calculate anything, because you can “add up” percents. For example, find 63% of 86. 63% = 50% + 10% + 3(1%) 50% of 86 is 43 10% of 86 is 8.6 1% of 86 is 0.86 (and we need 3%, so it’s really 3 × 0.86) Around about now,you’ll be glancing at the answer choices to see whether you can estimate from here, because adding that up is annoying. If you are really pressed, you might go as far as, “It’s 51.6 plus a little less than 3, so around 54.” That’ll be enough for you to get to the answer from options. quantitative aptitude tricks and shortcuts for cat cat shortcuts for quant pdf cat quantitative aptitude shortcuts pdf shortcut tricks for cat cat quant tricks pdf cat shortcut techniques geometry shortcuts for cat pdf quant shortcuts for bank exams