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TOPIC: We're increasing the PMP Exam Time in Simulator from 230 to 250 mins

We're increasing the PMP Exam Time in Simulator from 230 to 250 mins 2 years 1 month ago #26238

  • Cornelius Fichtner
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In December of 2020, the Project Management Institute (PMI) changed the structure of the PMP exam by adding two breaks as follows:
- Answer 60 questions
- Optional 10-minute break
- Answer 60 questions
- Optional 10-minute break
- Answer 60 questions
- Exam End

We are currently analyzing this change and will decide on the best course of action for adding this new feature to The PMP Exam Simulator. In the meantime, while we perform this analysis and review, we will implement the following workaround:
(1) On Thursday, February 04 at around 2pm PST, we will increase the time allotted for PMP Exam 1, PMP Exam 2, PMP Exam 3, and PMP Exam 4 from 230 minutes to 250 minutes (*).
(2) Each time you start one of these 4 exams, a message is displayed encouraging you to take a 10-minute break after answering 60 and 120 questions.
(3) Time management of these two breaks is 100% done by the exam taker. The simulator does not provide any automated support.

Here is how this would work when you take an exam:
- You start PMP Exam 1
- A message is displayed reminding you to take a break after 60 and 120 questions
- The exam countdown time begins at 250 minutes (*)
- The rest is up to you. You have to remember yourself to take a 10-minute break after 60 and 120 questions. The simulator will not remind you.

This means that in the simulator (unlike on the real PMP exam) any break time you do not use to actually take a break is available to you to answer the questions. However, we do not recommend this approach. Instead, we recommend that you schedule and take two full 10-minute breaks.

Please let me know if you have any questions by replying to this message in our forum


(*) The total time will actually be 252 minutes and is due to a rounding difference in the simulator software.
Until Next Time,
Cornelius Fichtner, PMP, CSM
President, OSP International LLC
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Last edit: by Cornelius Fichtner.

We're increasing the PMP Exam Time in Simulator from 230 to 250 mins 2 years 1 month ago #26252

  • Dorothy Ameyaw
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Thank you but please is the 10min break inclusive of your total duration for exams?

Dorothy
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We're increasing the PMP Exam Time in Simulator from 230 to 250 mins 2 years 1 month ago #26280

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On the real PMP exam, you have 230 minutes to answer 180 questions.

The two 10-minute breaks are outside of this and do not count against your exam time.
Until Next Time,
Cornelius Fichtner, PMP, CSM
President, OSP International LLC
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We're increasing the PMP Exam Time in Simulator from 230 to 250 mins 2 years 1 month ago #26286

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Hello everyone,

The duration of the PMP exams in the Simulator has been updated from 230 to 252 minutes as communicated in this post:
www.project-management-prepcast.com/kune...30-to-250-mins#26238

We hope you find the PMP Exam Simulator an effective and useful tool for your exam preparation. Best of luck, and thank you for being our customers!
Regards,
Stan Po, MBA, PMP, PMI-ACP, CSM, CIPP
Product and Program Manager
OSP International LLC
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Last edit: by Stan Po - Admin.

We're increasing the PMP Exam Time in Simulator from 230 to 250 mins 2 years 2 weeks ago #26643

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Thank you , Just can you please advise how i can stop the time during the exam to take the break
Shall i push on the timiig tap

We're increasing the PMP Exam Time in Simulator from 230 to 250 mins 2 years 2 weeks ago #26648

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Hello Ehab,

You cannot stop the timer. That's the whole idea of having 250 minutes (252 to be exact) for the exam AND the two 10-minute breaks. You should manage your time as if you were taking the real exam. In other words, after you answer 60 questions, take your first 10-min break. Then answer 60 more questions and take your second 10-min break. After that, you answer the remaining 60 questions and finish the exam.

I hope this clarifies.
Regards,
Stan Po, MBA, PMP, PMI-ACP, CSM, CIPP
Product and Program Manager
OSP International LLC

We're increasing the PMP Exam Time in Simulator from 230 to 250 mins 2 years 1 week ago #26662

  • Murali Kumar
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if we do not take break after 60 questions, break time is added to the exam time or not

We're increasing the PMP Exam Time in Simulator from 230 to 250 mins 2 years 1 week ago #26663

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Hello Murali,

Yes, in the simulator, if you do not take the breaks, you have more time to answer questions. However, we do NOT recommend taking this approach as you may get used to having more time per question on average, and when you take the real exam, you may run out of time.
Regards,
Stan Po, MBA, PMP, PMI-ACP, CSM, CIPP
Product and Program Manager
OSP International LLC

We're increasing the PMP Exam Time in Simulator from 230 to 250 mins 2 years 1 week ago #26728

  • Shikha Shikha
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If I do not take these two scheduled breaks of 10-10 minutes in real PMP exam, will those extra 20 mins be added to my 230 minutes allotted to answer 180 questions (in real PMP exam)?

Are these breaks are mandatory to take?

We're increasing the PMP Exam Time in Simulator from 230 to 250 mins 2 years 1 week ago #26740

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Hello Shikha,

The answers to both of your questions are NO.

For more details, please watch the video from the live Q&A session that Cornelius hosted on Feb 15, 2021. Jump to the timestamp at 47:00, where Cornelius provides a very extensive explanation about the breaks.
The title of the video is: Lessons Learned from the 2021 PMP® Exam
The URL to the video is:


I hope this helps.
Regards,
Stan Po, MBA, PMP, PMI-ACP, CSM, CIPP
Product and Program Manager
OSP International LLC
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We're increasing the PMP Exam Time in Simulator from 230 to 250 mins 1 year 10 months ago #27400

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Thank you
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We're increasing the PMP Exam Time in Simulator from 230 to 250 mins 1 year 9 months ago #27491

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So I am assuming that on the real exam the clock starts at 250 and never stops.
Once we finish replying to the first set of 60 questions, it will advise us to have a 10min break but the clock keeps going down.
If we assign a 75 min period to reply to 60 questions (average 1min and 25sec per question) and stick to that pace, we should reach the first break when the clock marks 175.
We then stop for 10 minutes and resume the exam when the clock shows 165.
Maintaining the pace, we should finish the second set of 60 questions when the clock marks 90.
We then pause for 10 min again and resume the exam for the last set of 60 questions when the clock shows 80.
Given that we cannot have any notes, we should memorize that we need to reach the end of the first set of 60 questions at 175 and the second and 90.
Is this correct?

We're increasing the PMP Exam Time in Simulator from 230 to 250 mins 1 year 8 months ago #27704

  • Anushri Kumar
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Hello,
I have just gotten access to my free 7 day trial but when I click on the PMP 1 Test it shows me only 23 questions? How do I access the full length exam?
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We're increasing the PMP Exam Time in Simulator from 230 to 250 mins 1 year 8 months ago #27736

  • Emmanuel Darco
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I took all the breaks allocated and still completed the exam with still 28 minutes left. It all depends on how well one has prepared for the exam and I did not even mark any questions for reviews.

Cheers,

Emmanuel

We're increasing the PMP Exam Time in Simulator from 230 to 250 mins 1 year 7 months ago #27966

  • Gayathri Mohan
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Is taking the break time bound? We are here talking about taking break after every 60 questions. What is the ideal time that one should spend on each batch of 60 questions.

We're increasing the PMP Exam Time in Simulator from 230 to 250 mins 1 year 6 months ago #28184

  • Marzieh Kazeminejad
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Hello,
Your explanation is somehow correct, but I think the real PMP exam starts at 230. When the question 60 is answered (it is supposed to take 75 min exactly), the time is stopped at 155 min. whether you take advantage of 10 min or not, when you start the exam again the monitor show you the question 61 and the total remaining time is 155 min.
Again, when the question 120 is answered (it is supposed to take 75 min exactly), the time is stopped at 80 min, in 10 min, the exam starts in question 121 and the total remaining time is 80 min.

We're increasing the PMP Exam Time in Simulator from 230 to 250 mins 11 months 2 weeks ago #29268

  • Reham Youssef
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Since this is a practice platform, I hope you can add a pause button/feature to the Exam simulator, in case we'd like to solve it and we got busy for any reason we don't lose all the data.

We're increasing the PMP Exam Time in Simulator from 230 to 250 mins 9 months 3 weeks ago #29463

  • Rajyalakshmi Bommaraju
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How to stop the exam to take 10 min break after 60 questions? Click "END EXAM" or Close the browser? It is not clear from above instructions.

We're increasing the PMP Exam Time in Simulator from 230 to 250 mins 2 months 3 weeks ago #30134

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Thank you very much Sir.

We're increasing the PMP Exam Time in Simulator from 230 to 250 mins 2 months 3 days ago #30179

  • Dominic Hickey
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Having taken the exam in a test centre recently (January 2023), I'd just like to add some clarification on timing for anyone who is preparing to sit the PMP exam soon. I do not know what, if anything, differs when taking the online-proctored exam.

In the real exam, after the intro and tutorial, the countdown timer in the top right-hand corner of your screen starts at 230:00. After you have gone through, but not necessarily answered, the first 60 questions, there is an on-screen prompt indicating that a break is programmed before question 61 and reminding you to review your questions. Using the Review screen, you can look through a vertical list of the 60 questions which clearly shows if any are Incomplete (i.e. not answered), Flagged for Review (if you flagged any), or both. Returning to any question is quick and easy, as is filtering the list by Flagged and/or Incomplete. When you are happy with your answers, you have to press End Review.

If I recall correctly, this brings you directly to your break screen, although there might have been an 'Are you sure Y/N?' dialogue box in between.
On the break screen, a different timer counts down from 10:00. In the background, the question timer is effectively paused until the break timer reaches 00:00, or if the candidate chooses to end the break early. If you return before the 10 minutes are up, you can interrupt the break at any time and start on question 61.

Assuming you want to make the most of the break, it's a good idea to leave the exam room straightaway. Before anything else, check the time on a real clock -- since you have no devices or watch on your person -- so that you have a good idea of when your break will end. It's funny what exam stress does to people's perception of time. For some people it becomes heightened and they have a great sense of how many minutes and seconds are remaining. For others, the pressure causes them to become less clear-headed and to gauge time poorly.
To be clear, there is no exam advantage to be had in cutting short the break time. Take care of your physical needs, move about a bit, have something to drink and/or eat from your locker if you know this will help you.

Before the 10 minutes of break time end, get back to your station. At my test centre, the supervisor had to accompany each person physically and unlock their exam station with a login and password. At that point, the candidate can restart the question-taking process by clicking on a Resume button. If you still have, say, two minutes of break left and want to wait a little longer, you can do so. The break timer is still visible. When you do click Resume, question 61 appears and the main exam timer restarts from exactly where you left it before the break.
The same process occurs after you have gone through question 120.

At the end, the main timer counts down to zero and cuts access to the questions, unless you have already pressed End Review yourself before that point, ending the exam. There is no scoring advantage whatsoever to finishing earlier, so use all the time that you need to be sure you're happy with your answers. If you're a speed demon and are fully satisfied with all of your answers with 30 minutes left to go, feel free to end the review and thus the exam.

Everyone operates differently in the exam. I had classmates who finished their blocks of 60 questions very rapidly and had acres of surplus time. Others used up every second available. Some people notice that they become heavily fatigued over the course of the 180 questions (eyes blurring, ability to concentrate diminishing), while others are like endurance athletes and maintain similar levels throughout. If you're used to spending long periods working at a screen, you'll probably be more comfortable at the end than someone who isn't. The great value of taking the PM PrepCast Exams in the Simulator is to test not only your ability to answer the questions, but also to see how you are affected physically by the experience. Practicing this part of exam technique can only aid you.

Once you know when during the day your real exam will taking place, I would strongly recommend taking your simulator exams at that same time of day. If your real exam starts at 2pm and you know that you're not usually at your best mentally in the afternoon, then practice starting the exam at 2pm, in as close to exam conditions as possible, to find the best strategy for performing as well as possible. Eat and drink like you would be able to before and during the exam, don't use any other timing devices other than the countdown timer on the screen during the question-answering blocks, and respect the 10-minute break maximums. If your life schedule is hectic, do still prioritize these practice exams. Tell the world you're incommunicado for at least 4 hours 10 minutes, put your devices on airplane mode, put up do not disturb signs, etc. Even one practice exam will give you a great amount of feedback on what to expect on exam day.

The only thing that you need to do differently when heading into the real exam when coming from the PM PrepCast Simulator Exams are your rough guides to progress on the timers.
I'm not used to counting down large periods of time in decimal sets of minutes. I know straightaway where I am with "2 hours 25 minutes left", not so much with "145 minutes left". If you're prone to using up more than the 1 minute-and-16.67 seconds that are available on average for a question and want to track your progress, it's good to have 'red line' guides for the end of each 60-question block to know that you're not behind schedule, assuming a near-constant question-taking rate. If you know that you slow down or speed up consistently during practice exams, it might be worth adapting your red line times to this phenomenon.

For the PrepCast exams, I used a limit of 174:00 after the first 60 questions, and then 88:00 after 120 questions. Don't forget that in this system, if you take a 10-minute break after reaching 174:00, when you come back, the timer is going to be at 164:00. By the way, during the PrepCast Exams, I also only allowed myself to review the 60 questions in the block I was completing, just like during the real exam, even though PrepCast does allow users to review any of the 180 questions at any time.
For the real exam, I had memorized just two numbers: I wanted to be at no lower than 154:00 after the first 60 questions, and no lower than 78:00 after the second block. I left myself slightly more time in the final block, as I knew I would likely be slower due to cumulated fatigue. This helped me and wasn't cumbersome. If you're great at memorizing figures, knowing your intermediate red lines might also be useful, but I found that that became excessive detail.

I hope that this helps some other people with their preparation.
Dominic Hickey, PMP
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We're increasing the PMP Exam Time in Simulator from 230 to 250 mins 1 month 10 hours ago #30291

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Thank you people for nicely organizing the exam simulator. .
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