One-Hour LSAT

One hour per day is enough to beat the LSAT, if you invest each hour wisely.

I invite you to get moving in the right direction with the following schedule. If you have more than an hour, use the following as your foundation.

Here’s how you should spend your first LSAT-study hour every day.

Alternate timed sections with untimed review and practice. The exact days don’t matter, but the sequence should look something like this:

Monday: Do a timed section of Logical Reasoning, followed by an untimed review of the section.
 
Tuesday: Finish reviewing yesterday’s LR, if necessary. Do an hour of Demon’s Choice drilling, and carefully review any mistakes.
 
Wednesday: Do a timed section of Reading Comprehension, followed by an untimed review.
 
Thursday: Finish reviewing yesterday’s RC, if necessary. Do an hour of Demon’s Choice drilling, and carefully review any mistakes.
 
Friday: Do a timed section of Logical Reasoning, followed by an untimed review.
 
Saturday: Finish reviewing yesterday’s LR, if necessary. Do an hour of Demon’s Choice drilling, and carefully review any mistakes.
 
Sunday: Drill LR or RC, whichever section you find more challenging.

This is a calm, civilized schedule that’s sure to bring results over time. It accomplishes several goals at once:

• It covers a full LSAT each week.
• It offers timed and untimed practice in each section.
• It allows you to spend more time on your weaker section without neglecting the other section.
• It includes ample time for a review of each mistake.
• It allows you to do something slightly different every day, so you don’t get bored or complacent.

And it only takes one hour per day.

You’re not doing five hours of a bored, distracted LSAT grind. You’re doing one high-quality hour per day. Take this time seriously. Get the most out of it by approaching your timed sections, review, and extra practice with care.

Here’s how to approach your timed practice.

Make sure you will be uninterrupted for the duration of your timed sections. Do them in a distraction-free environment—ideally, in the same location and with the same setup you intend to use for your official online LSAT. Use airplane mode or “do not disturb” as necessary. Take precautions against distractions from friends, family, colleagues, and pets.

Work diligently for the entire 35 minutes without checking and re-checking the clock. Remember you’re not trying to finish the section. Accuracy is more important than speed. Take your time with each question and solve it before moving on. Get used to guessing on a few at the end of each section. This is the pacing you will use on your official test, so use it on your practice tests as well.

When you count up your scores, take them with a grain of salt. Over weeks and months, you will accumulate data about your test performances. But in the short term (anything less than a month) there is too much noise in the data. You’ll have better days and worse days along the way. Don’t make too much of them. Instead, focus on each mistake. Learning comes from review.

Here’s how to approach review of timed sections.

Treat every mistake as a precious opportunity to learn. The LSAT repeats itself. Your mistakes will do the same unless you inoculate yourself from them in your review.

First, redo the question. Do this “blind”—it’s better not to know what the correct answer is. Can you get it right if you’re a bit more careful?

Dig deeply into the right answer. Why is it conclusively correct? Why didn’t you see that the first time around? How will you avoid this mistake next time?

Dig deeply into the wrong answer you chose. Why is it conclusively wrong? Why did you pick it the first time around? How will you avoid this mistake next time?

Sometimes you’ll need help to reach a full understanding. Tutoring is expensive, but a study partner or group is free. It’s amazing how much progress you can make by teaching and learning from one another. You may also be able to find explanations on the internet. But be careful—some of those explanations might confuse you more than they help.

Demon subscribers have access to our incomparable video and written explanations for each question, and our Ask button quickly provides written responses when you’re stuck.

However you review, don’t move on from each mistake too quickly. Review is where the real progress is made.

Here’s how to approach your untimed extra practice.

Intersperse your timed sections with calm, careful practice of individual Logical Reasoning questions and Reading Comprehension passages. For Demon subscribers, this could be an hour of drilling with our smart drilling tool. If you’re not a Demon subscriber, just do one question at a time, focusing solely on accuracy.

Solve each question before moving on. Mistakes should be rare. You should take as long as you need to figure each one out. Expect to feel good about your chosen answer—you should clearly see why it is correct. Expect to confidently eliminate four wrong answers—you should notice how each one is wrong for a specific reason.

When you miss a question, you should be surprised. Spend as much time as necessary reviewing these precious mistakes. Dig deep, as described above. Rooting out these mistakes is the surest way to achieve a higher score.

If you’re not sure what to work on, spend more time working on your weaker section. Don’t neglect any area—make sure you practice a bit of everything each week. But your weaker section is where you have the most to gain. So lean in that direction when deciding what to do.

Demon subscribers use our smart drilling for their extra practice. Demon Live subscribers can also choose from a wide variety of classes throughout the week. We have multiple class options every day, with classes targeting every skill level and every topic.

No matter your current level or ultimate goal, one high-quality hour is the first step each day.