Ah, the infamous LSAT: the fire-breathing dragon guarding the law school gates. Depending on which attorney you ask, it’s a legal rite of passage or a horror show never to be remembered. But is it really as bad as it’s made out to be? Is the LSAT really hard?
The LSAT is challenging, yes, but it’s also highly learnable. Unlike other standardized exams that behave like thinly veiled IQ tests or rely on prior knowledge, the LSAT is all about skills: verbal reasoning, reading comprehension, and argument analysis.
Thankfully, these areas–although perhaps initially intimidating–can be improved with patience and diligent practice.
The LSAT: A Different Kind of Challenge
Imagine walking into a gym and trying to lift a 300-pound barbell off the ground with zero training. Next to impossible, right?
Now imagine you started with something like 50 lbs.
Twice a week, add 2.5 lbs to each side–55, 60, 65–and within just one month, you’d already be close to 100 lbs. Lifting 300 pounds using this method might be challenging, sure, but it wouldn’t exactly be hard–after all, you just nailed 295 last week!
Of course, results can vary, and some people score higher than others. Using the weightlifting analogy, you might “max out” at 200 pounds. Or 400! The point is, you will greatly improve from where you started. All it takes is following a process of deliberate practice, dogged persistence, and incremental improvement.
The LSAT is the same way. Many test-takers start with a “zero to hero” mindset and feel like it’s impossible to improve. However, by following a study plan and consistently adding small improvements, you can see significant progress in your scores.
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Curves that Would Make an Organic Chemistry Professor Blush
Some people would point out that the average LSAT score would be a failing grade on a “normal” test. Yikes. Does this make the LSAT hard?
Hardly! The LSAT is graded on a fairly generous curve. As the scores in the 120-180 range correspond to various percentiles, you are merely being measured against your peers. For example, a score of 165 is around the 87th percentile. That’s a great score–good enough to make you a competitive applicant at a top-25 law school. However, in terms of percentage correct, you need to get about 80% of questions correct to score in that range.
In other words, you need to succeed on the LSAT at a C+ or B- level in order to have a shot at some of the best law schools in the world. Sounds pretty good to me.
Further Reading
The LSAT is Hard, But It’s Learnable.Here’s Why
So how can we get to a C+ or B- level (or beyond)? One of the best aspects of the LSAT is that (say it with us again) it’s learnable. It rewards pattern recognition. We can not only get better over time, but also get faster. And we can do so while conquering all of our fears and anxieties that orbit this infamous test.
1. Most Question Types Follow Repeatable Patterns
The LSAT isn’t endlessly creative.
Logical Reasoning questions, for instance, follow well-defined templates. Sufficient/Necessary questions, Flaw questions, Strengthen/Weaken questions—each has a set of common logical structures. Arguments, conclusions, premises, assumptions; equivocations, causal flaws and other common fallacies; “characterization” or “operation” patterns that allow you evaluate an argument, dissect the premises and change the likelihood of the conclusion.
Yeah, my Blueprint LSAT classes and seminars cover a lot of patterns (and more than a few “hacks”), but once you learn them, you’ll start seeing familiar structures instead of random puzzles.
2. Wrong Answers Follow Predictable Traps
The test-maker doesn’t just write random wrong answers. These answer choices are designed to exploit common reasoning mistakes. That means once you understand the traps—like excessive logical force, backwards conditionality, or causation confusion—you can spot wrong answers quickly and eliminate them.
Yes, you will make many forehead-slapping mistakes on your road to learning these traps. But it’s just practice. Embrace these failures as part of the fun, and you’ll be fine.
3. Your Skills Compound Over Time
We’ve already covered this somewhat, but much like weight training or learning an instrument, LSAT prep is about consistent, incremental improvements that stand the test of time. A student scoring in the 140s can, with structured practice, move into the 160s. A 160 scorer can push into the 170s.
This is no party trick; studying for the LSAT will change your brain. It will make you smarter, and it will greatly impact how you read, how you think, and how you problem solve. I’ve had students take a three-month break from studying, only to come back and score just as high as where they left off. The skills are permanent!
LSAT skills also tend to cross-pollinate the more and more you practice. Doing 10, 20, 50, 100 Reading Comprehension passages will make you a more efficient, disciplined reader, but it will also improve your sharpness in Logical Reasoning. Learning how to pick apart a Logical Reasoning argument will reap benefits not just in Flaw questions, but in Parallel Flaw, Strengthen, Weaken, Assumption, and – yes, Reading Comprehension.
4. Speed is a Skill
This all sounds great so far, but the LSAT is a strictly timed exam. You might be thinking, “Accuracy is great, but how do I go fast?”
Here’s the beauty of it: rushing isn’t the solution–recognition is. As you get better at identifying these skills, strategies, and traps, you’ll become both more decisive and make better decisions. You’ll be fast without feeling hurried.
5. You Can Simulate Test-Day Conditions
And yes, even the non-LSAT specific stuff is learnable. Timing discipline? Learnable. Thinking clearly under pressure? Learnable. Managing test anxiety? Learnable.
I say this sincerely. I feel it deeply when a student confides in me their mental and emotional struggles with the LSAT. The scores, the percentiles, the pressure, the feeling judged.
Test anxiety is no joke.
But even here, we can find ways to improve! We can do test day “dress rehearsals,” simulating everything from the night before to the day of, including dinner, wind-down, sleep, and breakfast/”getting ready” routines. We can take practice tests with exact timing conditions, all the way down to the ten-minute halfway break.
If taking tests is our fear, taking LSAT practice tests is our antidote–our “exposure therapy.” That first practice exam probably wasn’t fun. Practice exams 2 through 5? No picnic either, but you’re grudgingly gutting ‘em out. Then, at some point, possibly practice test 7 or 8 (9? 10?), you become so sick of practice exams that you just do the darn thing. That’s usually where the score magic happens.
Final Thoughts
So, is the LSAT hard?
Sure, if you’re unprepared. But so is anything you haven’t trained for. The LSAT rewards practice, strategy, and skill-building – not genius. And that’s great news, because it means anyone willing to put in the work can improve their score. Make a plan, stay consistent, and you’ll find that the LSAT isn’t an impossible mountain – it’s a climbable one.
Ready to reach your LSAT potential? Blueprint LSAT students increase their LSAT scores by 15 points on average. Whether you want the flexibility of a Self-Paced Course, prefer to navigate the LSAT with instructors in a Live Course or 170+ Course, or even private LSAT tutoring, we have the study method that fits your learning style.
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