- UCAT
UCAT Situational Judgement – Complete Guide to Format, Scoring & Question Types
- The Situational Judgement Test (SJT) evaluates your non-academic, professional traits, such as ethics, empathy, and decision-making.
- It has 69 questions to be completed in 26 minutes, focused on real-world healthcare scenarios.
- It is scored in Bands (1–4), with Band 1 the highest — separately from your 900–2700 total.
- There are two official question types: rating (which carries partial marks) and ranking (which does not).
- The hard part is pace, not the judgement itself: 26 minutes for 69 questions leaves no time to deliberate.
Situational judgement is the final section of the UCAT test. It tests judgement rather than knowledge: teamwork, integrity and knowing when to ask for help. There are 69 questions under different real-life scenarios. The time limit is 26 minutes. Unlike verbal reasoning, decision making and quantitative reasoning — which are each scaled from 300 to 900 — situational judgement is reported as a band from 1 to 4 and sits outside your 900–2700 total.
What Is the UCAT Situational Judgement Section?
The situational judgement test in UCAT is all about assessing your interpersonal skills and behaviour. It has nothing to do with academic scores, but rather with a professional and behavioural approach towards the Medical field. You will be given hypothetical scenarios based on real-world situations. You have to show how you will react under those conditions.
This is the final section in the UCAT, and is scored in bands instead of marks. Its uniqueness is in its scoring difference from others and its separation from academic tests. You will see the example questions below, along with other details.
Why Is Situational Judgement Tested in the UCAT?
The situational Judgement test measures your soft skills that are required in this profession. You are judged by how compassionate and adaptable you are under different conditions. Only academics are not enough to judge the best fit for this field. Patients trust medical professionals with their health and future, so it’s better to only let the best fit in.
What Skills Does the SJ Section Assess?
SJ Section assesses multiple sections, including ethical reasoning, integrity, teamwork, communication, and decision-making under pressure. These soft skills define your personality and show how you will perform under pressured circumstances.
UCAT Situational Judgement Format and Timing
This section has a series of scenarios with multiple questions under each scenario. Each scenario may have up to six questions associated with it, which you answer based on the best possible course of action. The format is not numerical or academic like other tests. This time-bound, real-life test explores the judgement of the candidate, at an average of roughly 22 seconds per question.
UCAT Situational Judgement Time and Number of Questions
There will be 26 minutes for a total of 69 questions. Questions are grouped under scenarios, and each scenario may have up to six questions associated with it. That gives you around 22 seconds per question. Use the clock as a checkpoint rather than a stopwatch: at the halfway mark you want to be somewhere near question 35. If you are well behind, answer on first instinct rather than leaving anything blank.
Does Ucat Give Partial Marks?
Yes, and this is one of the few places in the UCAT where a close answer still earns you something. Within the Situational Judgement Test, full marks are awarded if your response matches the correct answer, and partial marks if your response is close to it. There is no negative marking anywhere in the SJT, so never leave anything blank.
The exception is ranking questions, where you must select both the most and the least appropriate action — no marks are awarded unless you get both. Your Situational Judgement result is reported as a band and is not added to the 900–2700 total from the three UCAT cognitive subtests.
Types of UCAT Situational Judgement Questions
Situational Judgement questions are not academic or mathematical like the verbal reasoning or quantitative reasoning sections. They are about real-life medical or clinical scenarios, and they do not require medical or procedural knowledge.
Officially there are two question types, not three:
- Rating — you rate the importance or the appropriateness of a single response, choosing one of four options. Partial marks are available if your answer is close to the correct one.
- Ranking — you pick the most and least appropriate action from three options. There are no partial marks: get both right or score zero on that question.
That asymmetry should change how you spend time. On a rating question a near-miss still scores, so answer every one even if you are guessing. On a ranking question a near-miss scores nothing, so it is worth the extra few seconds to check both ends before you move on. The sections below split rating into importance and appropriateness because they feel different to answer — but both are the same official question type.
Rating Questions: Importance
These ask how important a given consideration is for the person in the scenario. UCAT defines the four options as:
- Very important — if this is something that is vital to take into account.
- Important — if this is something that is important but not vital to take into account.
- Of minor importance — if this is something that could be taken into account, but it does not matter if it is considered or not.
- Not important at all — if this is something that should definitely not be taken into account.
Answer from the perspective of the character named in the question, not your own. Scenarios often introduce two or three people, so reread the stem and check whose judgement is being asked about before you rate anything.
Rating Questions: Appropriateness
These ask how appropriate one specific response would be. The four options are not a simple good/bad split — UCAT words them precisely, and the two middle options are where most marks are won and lost:
- A very appropriate thing to do — if it will address at least one aspect (not necessarily all aspects) of the situation.
- Appropriate, but not ideal — if it could be done, but is not necessarily a very good thing to do.
- Inappropriate, but not awful — if it should not really be done, but would not be terrible.
- A very inappropriate thing to do — if it should definitely not be done and would make the situation worse.
Note the qualifiers. “Appropriate, but not ideal” is not the same as “appropriate”: it means the action is defensible but there was a better option available. Read the labels as a plain four-point scale and those two middle options collapse into “a bit good” and “a bit bad”, which is exactly the distinction being tested. Judge each option on its own merits, too: several responses to the same scenario can carry the same rating.
Ranking Questions: Most and Least Appropriate
These give you a scenario and three possible actions. You choose the one most appropriate and the one least appropriate, using drag and drop. UCAT is explicit about the marking: you receive no marks at all unless you get both ends right.
Two things follow. There is no consolation mark here, so a ranking question is worth slowing down for in a way a rating question is not. But it is still never worth leaving blank, because an answer that might be right beats one that is certainly worth nothing. If you are short of time, decide the least appropriate action first: the clearly wrong option is usually easier to spot than the best one.
Situational Judgement Strategies
Like all other exams, the UCAT SJ Section also needs practice and hard work. But here are a few tips that you should follow to ace the UCAT Situational Judgement.
- Read the entire scenario carefully before jumping to the answers.
- Put yourself in the shoes of a responsible healthcare professional when answering.
- Watch out for key principles like honesty, teamwork, and patient safety
- Avoid choices that seem too extreme unless the situation clearly calls for it.
- Practice recognising subtle differences between “appropriate” and “very appropriate.”
- Time yourself while practising, aim to answer each question in under 25 seconds.
Good Medical Practice: The GMC Guidance UCAT Tells You to Read
UCAT’s own tutorial gives one specific piece of preparation advice: read the GMC’s Good Medical Practice. In UCAT’s words, previous high scoring candidates “found it helpful to apply the general principles contained in this document to the scenarios in the questions”.
That is the closest thing the SJT has to a syllabus. The panel of experts who set the correct answers are working from professional standards, so answers that align with those standards are more likely to match the model answer. UCAT sets out the general principles to apply:
- Listen to and respect the concerns and opinions of others — colleagues, patients and family members.
- Working collaboratively and with respect is always important.
- Dishonest or misleading answers will almost certainly always be inappropriate.
- Receiving feedback, both positive and negative, is a normal part of the learning process.
- Set aside any personal biases or beliefs.
- Recognise your limits and know when to seek help or support.
And where a scenario is clinical:
- Treat others with respect and sensitivity; never be dismissive.
- The overriding consideration should always be the patient’s wellbeing and safety.
- Never act in a manner that will bring the profession into disrepute.
- Always maintain patient confidentiality.
- Ensure the patient’s views are considered — a patient with mental capacity should always be involved in decisions about their treatment.
When two options both look reasonable, ask which one better matches the list above. It is the only published guidance you have about how the panel was thinking.
Source: UCAT Situational Judgement Question Tutorial, and the GMC’s Good Medical Practice.
How Are Ucat Scores Calculated?
The Situational Judgement section is scored differently from the rest of the UCAT. Instead of a scaled score out of 900, you receive a banding result between Band 1 and Band 4. Your performance is based on how closely your answers match the ideal solutions of the problems under discussion.
How is UCAT Situational Judgement Marked?
Each answer is compared to the ideal responses. You receive full marks if your response matches the perfect solutions, and partial marks if your answer is close. There’s no negative marking in this, so you should attempt all the questions according to your best understanding.
What Are the UCAT Bands (Band 1 to Band 4)?
Your result is placed in one of four bands, Band 1 being the highest. UCAT’s own descriptions of each band are set out further up this page, in their exact published wording.
What the bands are not is a mark out of anything. There is no raw score behind your band that you can work backwards to, and no percentile attached to it. A band is a statement about how closely your judgement matched a panel of practising clinicians and educators, and nothing more.
In practice, the gap that matters is between Bands 1 to 2 and Bands 3 to 4. Universities that use the SJT tend to draw their line there if they draw one at all, so that is the boundary worth preparing against.
What Is a Good UCAT Situational Judgement Score?
Band 1 and Band 2 are both good results, and in 2026 just over half of candidates (55%) finished in one of them. There is no percentile attached to a UK band, so nobody can tell you a band puts you in a given top percentage — that only exists for the scaled ANZ score.
The useful question is not “is this a good band” but “what does each university on my list do with it”. Some set a minimum, some use it only to separate otherwise equal applicants, some do not use it at all. Their admissions pages say which.
What the UCAT Situational Judgement Bands Actually Mean
The Situational Judgement Test is not converted to a scaled score in the UK. You receive a total score of 900–2700 from the three cognitive subtests, and your Situational Judgement result is reported separately as one of four bands. UCAT does not publish band cut-scores, so no table can convert a band into a mark — and any table that claims to is guessing.
These are the official band descriptions published by UCAT:
Band | What UCAT says it means |
Band 1 | Those in Band 1 demonstrated an excellent level of performance, showing similar judgement in most cases to the panel of experts. |
Band 2 | Those in Band 2 demonstrated a good, solid level of performance, showing appropriate judgement frequently, with many responses matching model answers. |
Band 3 | Those in Band 3 demonstrated a modest level of performance, with appropriate judgement shown for some questions and substantial differences from ideal responses for others. |
Band 4 | The performance of those in Band 4 was low, with judgement tending to differ substantially from ideal responses in many cases. |
Source: UCAT, Test Format and Scoring.
UCAT Situational Judgement Sample Questions and Answers
The following are example scenarios in the same formats UCAT uses. These are for familiarity with the format; difficulty in the real test can be higher.
Example 1 — Rating (importance)
A patient is upset because they had to wait over an hour past their appointment time. The junior doctor on duty looks flustered and mentions it’s been a hectic day in A&E.
How important is it for you, as a medical student observing the situation, to ask the patient how they’re feeling?
- A. Very important
- B. Important
- C. Of minor importance
- D. Not important at all
Correct answer: A. Acknowledging how the patient feels costs nothing and addresses the concern the patient actually raised.
Example 2 — Rating (appropriateness)
You’re shadowing a GP when you overhear them joking about a patient’s unusual symptoms in the staff room.
How appropriate is it to privately talk to the GP about how their comment might affect patient trust?
- A. A very appropriate thing to do
- B. Appropriate, but not ideal
- C. Inappropriate, but not awful
- D. A very inappropriate thing to do
Correct answer: A. Raising it privately addresses the problem without embarrassing the GP in front of colleagues. Note the exact option wording — this is how the four choices appear in the real test.
Example 3 — Ranking (most and least appropriate)
A fellow medical student forgot to submit their logbook and asks you to say they were with you on the ward when they actually weren’t.
Choose both the one most appropriate action and the one least appropriate action. You will not receive any marks unless you select both.
- A. Decline, and suggest they explain the situation to their supervisor themselves
- B. Agree, since it’s a small issue and won’t affect patient care
- C. Say nothing to them, but report them to the supervisor yourself
Most appropriate: A. Least appropriate: B. A is honest and still supports your colleague to put it right themselves. B asks you to lie on a formal record, which is never acceptable. C is not the worst option — escalating is defensible — but going behind their back without speaking to them first is not the best first step. Note that this format gives you three actions and requires both ends: pick only the least appropriate and you score nothing.
UCAT SJ Scores: UK vs UCAT ANZ Comparison
The Situational Judgement section is scored differently depending on where you take the UCAT. In the UK, SJT scores are reported in bands (1 to 4). In contrast, UCAT Situational Judgement ANZ use a scaled score out of 900, just like the other UCAT subtests.
Average Scores Over the Years (UK Banding)
Band 1 is the highest result and Band 4 the lowest. Because the bands are set against expert judgement each year, the split moves between test cycles — which is why a band is best read against the year you sat, not against an older cohort. Here is how UK candidates performed in the three most recent cycles UCAT publishes:
Year | Candidates | Band 1 | Band 2 | Band 3 | Band 4 |
2026 | 42,359 | 15% | 40% | 34% | 11% |
2025 | 41,354 | 21% | 39% | 29% | 10% |
2024 | 37,913 | 13% | 36% | 38% | 13% |
Read that 2026 row before you panic about a Band 2: more than half of candidates finish in Band 1 or Band 2. What matters more than the distribution is how the schools on your list actually use the SJT, and that varies — a minimum band at one, a tie-breaker at another, no weight at all at a third. Check each school’s own admissions page rather than assuming any band is safe.
Source: UCAT 2026, 2025 and 2024 test statistics. UCAT no longer archives statistics from before 2024, so earlier years are not shown here rather than quoted from a source we cannot check.
Differences Between UK and ANZ Scoring
In UCAT ANZ, Situational Judgement is marked out of 900, similar to the other sections like QR and VR. Here are the mean scaled scores UCAT ANZ has published:
Year | Mean SJT score | Top 20% starts at |
2025 | 586 | 649 |
2024 | 569 | 632 |
2023 | 578 | 644 |
2022 | 568 | 639 |
2021 | 581 | 647 |
2020 | 592 | 655 |
Note that the threshold moves every year, which is why a single “good score” number is misleading. The 8th decile — the score that puts you in the top 20% — has ranged from 632 to 655 across these six cycles. Read your score against the year you sat, not against a figure quoted on a forum.
Source: UCAT ANZ summary test statistics, 2020 to 2025. These are ANZ figures and do not apply to the UK test, which is banded rather than scaled.
UCAT Situational Judgement Practice Materials
At DreamMedic, we are providing our students with a large bank of preparation material, both free and paid. Our mock exams, question bank, and practice material prepare our students for the actual test day.
SJ Questions PDF Download
You can download situational judgment questions in PDF format. Download the materials and practice at your own pace. These types of questions only require mental preparation. Make the desired skills that are tested in this section, part of your personality.
Online Practice Test and Mock Questions
You can find plenty of online materials, from the official site and also from third-party resources. But at DreamMedic, you can prepare from our online resources. Our UCAT Situational Judgement Practice Test section has a huge library of demo tests for preparation.
Frequently Asked Questions about UCAT Situational Judgement
Yes, many UK medical and dental schools do take the Situational Judgement (SJ) score into account during admissions. Some use it to shortlist candidates, while others only refer to it post-interview or as part of a holistic assessment.
Band 2 is a good result. UCAT describes it as "a good, solid level of performance, showing appropriate judgement frequently, with many responses matching model answers".
Be realistic about where it sits, though: in 2026, 15% of candidates achieved Band 1 and 40% achieved Band 2, so the typical candidate lands in Band 2 — it is the middle of the pack rather than well above it. How much that matters depends entirely on where you apply. Schools publish how they use the SJT and the rules differ: a minimum band at one, a tie-breaker at another, nothing at all at a third. Look up the rule for each school on your list before you read anything into your band.
Band 1 is the strongest result, and on the 2026 figures about one candidate in seven achieved it. Beyond that, "preferred" depends entirely on the university: the SJT is used differently at each one, from a hard minimum band to no weight at all.
Rather than aiming at a band because it sounds safe, check the admissions pages of the schools you are actually applying to and find out what each one does with the SJT result.
Be careful with "SJT score calculators" you find online — for the UK test, none of them can work. UCAT does not publish band cut-scores, so there is no published way to turn a number of correct answers into a Band 1, 2, 3 or 4. Any UK calculator claiming to do this is guessing, and planning around its output is a good way to mis-judge your application.
What is real: in the UK you receive a band from 1 to 4, reported separately from your 900–2700 total. In ANZ, situational judgement is scaled from 300 to 900 like the other subtests, so a scaled score genuinely does exist there. If you want to gauge your UK performance, compare against the published band distributions above rather than any calculator.
