EPSO abstract reasoning test: format, pass score and practice
The EPSO abstract reasoning test measures your ability to spot the rule governing a series of figures: 10 questions in 10 minutes, one minute per question.
Applications closed
- Application deadline
- Last verified
Notice EPSO/AD/427/26
Official test parameters
Nothing in it is verbal or numerical. It is shapes, positions, rotations and counts, and the question asked is always the same one: what changes from one cell to the next, and under which rule.
- Questions
- 10
- Duration
- 10min
- Pass score
- 10/20 (combined)
- Weight
- -
- Scoring
- 1 pt/question
- Eliminatory
- Yes
- Ranked
- No
- Notice
- EPSO/AD/427/26
The pass score is not individual: this test is marked together with numerical reasoning, and the combined score for the two tests must reach 10/20.
Verbal reasoning
Numerical reasoning
Abstract reasoning
EU knowledge
Digital skills
EUFTE (written test)
Content based on the notice EPSO/AD/427/26 (C/2026/711). Official parameters last verified: .
Which competitions include this test
Abstract reasoning sits alongside verbal and numerical reasoning in almost every EPSO competition, from generalist administrators to assistants and specialists.
The table below sets out, competition by competition, the settings published in the Official Journal: number of questions, duration, and how the pass score is calculated.
It is the shortest test in the competition, and often the most underestimated: ten minutes are enough to cost you your place in the next stage when the pass score is shared with numerical reasoning.
Administrateurs généralistes (AD 5)EPSO/AD/427/26
Assistants communication (AST 3)EPSO/AST/157/25
Administrateurs audit (AD 7)EPSO/AD/428/26
CAST Permanent (agents contractuels FG I à FG IV)CAST Permanent
Administrateurs fiscalité (AD 6)EPSO/AD/422/25
Administrateurs gestion et connaissance des données (AD 7)EPSO/AD/426/25
Juristes-linguistes CJUE (AD 7)EPSO/AD/424/25
Juristes-linguistes et réviseurs juridiques PE, Conseil, Commission (AD 7)EPSO/AD/423/25
Administrateurs TIC (AD 7)EPSO/AD/429/26
Traducteurs (AD 5)EPSO/AD/414/24 a EPSO/AD/421/24
The competition families
- AD 5
Generalist administrators
- AST 3
Communication assistants (AST 3)
- AD 7
Administrators in the field of audit (AD 7)
- CAST
Contract agents (permanent)
- AD 6
Administrators in taxation (AD 6)
- AD 7
Administrators in data and knowledge management (AD 7)
- AD 7
CJEU lawyer-linguists (AD 7)
- AD 7
Lawyer-linguists and legal revisers for the EP, Council and Commission (AD 7)
- AD 7
ICT administrators (AD 7)
- AD 5
Translators (AD 5)
What it really measures, and what it does not
What the test measures
- Rule detection: identifying what varies systematically within a series, and what does not vary at all.
- The ability to isolate one variable at a time, when several change at once (shape, fill, rotation, number).
- Resistance to visual decoys: an appealing symmetry that governs nothing.
- Speed of decision: at 10 questions in 10 minutes, one minute per question, hesitating costs more than getting one wrong.
What it does not measure
- Your vocabulary or your command of a language: the test is deliberately non-verbal.
- Your level in mathematics: counting elements is not calculating.
- Your knowledge of European affairs: no background knowledge is called on.
- Your artistic sense: regularity matters more than beauty, and a pleasing figure is no more likely to be the right one.
The format in detail: the five recurring rules
The notice of competition publishes no sub-domains for abstract reasoning: it sets the number of questions, the duration and the way the pass score works, not a taxonomy. What follows is therefore not an official list, but the typology we draw from our own question bank, which covers the vast majority of the series you will meet.
Progression
An element repeats while growing or shrinking at a steady rate: one more side on the polygon, one more dot, a size that increases. You need three cells to read the rule, not two.
Rotation
A figure turns by a constant angle in each cell. The trap is direction: a 90-degree turn clockwise and a 270-degree turn anticlockwise give the same image, but not the same continuation.
Alternation
Two states follow one another, every other cell. The series looks irregular as long as you read it cell by cell, and becomes obvious once you read it in steps of two.
Two rules combined
A shape rotates while a fill alternates. This is the family that separates candidates: the method is to isolate one variable, check it on its own, then move on to the next.
The constant element
One detail never changes while everything moves around it. It does not help you find the rule, it helps you eliminate: any option that alters it is wrong.
Typology established by Erudiam on its own question bank. The official notice of competition publishes no sub-domains for this test: the only official figures on this page are those in the table and the banner, taken from the Official Journal.
Common mistakes and method
The most widespread mistake is to look for the answer before you have stated the rule. Until you can put the rule into a single sentence, all five options look alike.
The second is to read the series from left to right like a piece of text. Many series read better by columns, or in steps of two.
The third is stubbornness. At one minute per question, a series that resists for thirty seconds should be flagged and left: getting stuck costs you two easy questions.
The method that works
name what varies, name what does not, check the rule on the first three cells, then eliminate the options that contradict it before choosing.
How Erudiam trains this test
- Every explanation names the rule in plain words and shows by which mechanism each wrong option fails: you improve by identifying the rules you are blind to, not by running through series after series.
- Spaced repetition (the FSRS algorithm) reschedules the families of rules you miss, rather than the ones you have already mastered.
- The readiness index (ERI) combines coverage, regularity and success rate to tell you whether you are ready, on this test as on the others in the competition.
- Real-conditions tests reproduce the time constraint: ten minutes is what this test is really about.
Frequently asked questions about the abstract reasoning test
10 questions in 10 minutes in the competition for generalist administrators, according to the official notice (reference at the foot of the page). The settings differ from one competition to another: the table on this page compares them.
There is no individual pass score for this test in this competition: it is marked together with numerical reasoning, and the combined score for the two tests must reach 10 points out of 20. A weak result in abstract reasoning can therefore be offset by numerical reasoning, and the other way round.
No, and that is the whole point of it. The test is deliberately non-verbal: it measures the detection of logical patterns without relying on language, numbers or spatial orientation.
Yes, and it is the test where practice pays off fastest, because the repertoire of rules is finite. Progression, rotation, alternation, combination, constant element: once you recognise these families at a glance, the time spent per question drops sharply.
Because abstract questions are series of figures, and we would rather show nothing than a badly rendered figure. The complete series are in the practice area, where they appear exactly as they do in the test.
By working one family of rules at a time rather than running through series at random: find the one that catches you out, drill it on its own, then take a test under real conditions again to check that it holds at one minute per question.
