Are these real LSAT questions?

Yes. Every question on this page comes from an officially released LSAT (PrepTests 123, 141, and 146), written by LSAC, the organization that makes the test. The explanations are 7Sage's.

How many questions are on the LSAT?

The LSAT has four 35-minute multiple-choice sections of about 25 questions each: two Logical Reasoning sections, one Reading Comprehension section, and one unscored experimental section that can be either kind. Your score, from 120 to 180, comes from the three scored sections. There's also an unscored writing sample, LSAT Argumentative Writing, that you take separately.

What types of questions are on the LSAT?

Two kinds: Logical Reasoning, where you analyze a short argument, and Reading Comprehension, where you answer questions about a longer passage. Logic Games was dropped in August 2024. Within each kind, questions fall into recognizable types, like flaw, strengthen, and main point. See every Logical Reasoning question type and every Reading Comprehension question type .

Where can I find more free LSAT practice questions?

The free mini-diagnostic gives you five more questions and an estimated score. A free full-length practice test gives you the whole test, timed. And 7Sage's explanation library covers questions from every released LSAT.

Free LSAT resources

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Sample LSAT Practice Questions

Real questions from official LSATs. Pick an answer to see whether you're right and why.

Question 1

From PrepTest 123

Consumer: The latest Connorly Report suggests that Ocksenfrey prepackaged meals are virtually devoid of nutritional value. But the Connorly Report is commissioned by Danto Foods, Ocksenfrey's largest corporate rival, and early drafts of the report are submitted for approval to Danto Foods' public relations department. Because of the obvious bias of this report, it is clear that Ocksenfrey's prepackaged meals really are nutritious.

The reasoning in the consumer's argument is most vulnerable to criticism on the grounds that the argument

Question 2

From PrepTest 146

Archaeologist: The earliest evidence of controlled fire use in Europe dates to just 400,000 years ago. This casts doubt on the commonly held view that, because of Europe's cold winter climate, mastery of fire was a necessary prerequisite for humans' migration there.

Which one of the following is an assumption required by the argument?

Question 3

From PrepTest 146

A six-month public health campaign sought to limit the spread of influenza by encouraging people to take precautions such as washing their hands frequently and avoiding public places when they experience influenza symptoms. Since the incidence of influenza was much lower during those months than experts had predicted, the public evidently heeded the campaign.

Which one of the following, if true, most strengthens the argument?

Question 4

From PrepTest 141

Hine's emerald dragonflies are an endangered species that live in wetlands. The larvae of these dragonflies can survive only in the water, where they are subject to predation by several species including red devil crayfish. Surprisingly, the dragonfly populations are more likely to remain healthy in areas where red devil crayfish are present than in areas without red devil crayfish.

Which one of the following, if true, most helps to explain the surprising fact?

Question 5

From PrepTest 123

Economist: Every business strives to increase its productivity, for this increases profits for the owners and the likelihood that the business will survive. But not all efforts to increase productivity are beneficial to the business as a whole. Often, attempts to increase productivity decrease the number of employees, which clearly harms the dismissed employees as well as the sense of security of the retained employees.

Which one of the following most accurately expresses the main conclusion of the economist's argument?

Question 6

From PrepTest 141

Clearly, a democracy cannot thrive without effective news media. After all, a democracy cannot thrive without an electorate that is knowledgeable about important political issues, and an electorate can be knowledgeable in this way only if it has access to unbiased information about the government.

The argument's conclusion is properly inferred if which one of the following is assumed?

Question 7

From PrepTest 141

Worldwide, more books were sold last year than in any previous year. In particular, there were more cookbooks sold. For the first time ever, most of the cookbooks sold were not intended for beginners. Indeed, more cookbooks than ever were purchased by professional cooks. However, one of the few books available on every continent is a cookbook written for beginners, entitled Problem-Free Cooking.

Which one of the following is most strongly supported by the information above?

Question 8

From PrepTest 123

A cup of raw milk, after being heated in a microwave oven to 50 degrees Celsius, contains half its initial concentration of a particular enzyme, lysozyme. If, however, the milk reaches that temperature through exposure to a conventional heat source of 50 degrees Celsius, it will contain nearly all of its initial concentration of the enzyme. Therefore, what destroys the enzyme is not heat but microwaves, which generate heat.

Which one of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the argument?

Anatomy of a Logical Reasoning (LR) question

The LSAT has four sections split between two types: Logical Reasoning (LR) and Reading Comprehension (RC). Let's look at a real LR question:

Most of the students who took Spanish 101 at the university last semester attended every class session. However, each student who received a grade lower than B minus missed at least one class session.

21.

Which one of the following statements about the students who took Spanish 101 at the university last semester can be properly inferred from the information above?

a
At least some of the students who received a grade of A minus or higher attended every class session.
b
Most, if not all, of the students who missed at least one class session received a grade lower than B minus.
c
Most of the students received a grade higher than B minus.
d
At least one student who received a grade of B minus or higher missed one or more class sessions.
e
More than half of the students received a grade of B minus or higher.

From PrepTest 141 Answer and explanation →

This question, like every LR question, has three parts:

A brief passage
A question about it
Five answer choices

Let's look at each of these parts in more detail. We'll start with the brief passage. We call this passage the stimulus.

The stimulus

The stimulus is a series of claims that you'll need to analyze. Sometimes, like in the example above, the claims are simply presented as a set of facts.

This stimulus is a set of facts.

21.

Which one of the following statements about the students who took Spanish 101 at the university last semester can be properly inferred from the information above?

a
At least some of the students who received a grade of A minus or higher attended every class session.
b
Most, if not all, of the students who missed at least one class session received a grade lower than B minus.
c
Most of the students received a grade higher than B minus.
d
At least one student who received a grade of B minus or higher missed one or more class sessions.
e
More than half of the students received a grade of B minus or higher.

From PrepTest 141 Answer and explanation →

The claims in the stimulus won't always be a neutral set of facts, though. Often, they'll form an argument designed to lead to a certain conclusion, like below:

Marketing consultant: Last year I predicted that LRG's latest advertising campaign would be unpopular with customers and ineffective in promoting new products. But LRG ignored my predictions and took the advice of a competing consultant. This season's sales figures show that sales are down and LRG's new products are selling especially poorly. Thus, the advertising campaign was ill conceived.

This stimulus is an argument.

15.

The marketing consultant's reasoning is most vulnerable to criticism on the grounds that

a
it takes for granted that LRG's sales would not have been lower still in the absence of the competitor's advertising campaign
b
it fails to consider that economic factors unrelated to the advertising campaign may have caused LRG's low sales figures
c
it takes for granted that in LRG's industry, new products should outsell established products
d
it takes for granted that the higher sales of established products are due to effective advertising
e
it confuses a condition necessary for increasing product sales with a condition that will ensure increased sales

From PrepTest 141 Answer and explanation →

Here, the stimulus presents us with an argument meant to persuade us that, in the marketing consultant's words, "the advertising campaign was ill conceived."

Speaking of the marketing consultant, note how this stimulus begins by telling us who's speaking. In LSAT terminology, we call that source "the author." Sometimes the author is not identified. Other times, as in this example, the stimulus will identify the author to give us extra context and help us understand the scenario.

Occasionally, the stimulus will even have multiple authors, like this:

Taylor: Researchers at a local university claim that 61 percent of the information transferred during a conversation is communicated through nonverbal signals. But this claim, like all such mathematically precise claims, is suspect, because claims of such exactitude could never be established by science.

Sandra: While precision is unobtainable in many areas of life, it is commonplace in others. Many scientific disciplines obtain extremely precise results, which should not be doubted merely because of their precision.

This stimulus has multiple authors.

16.

The statements above provide the most support for holding that Sandra would disagree with Taylor about which one of the following statements?

a
Research might reveal that 61 percent of the information taken in during a conversation is communicated through nonverbal signals.
b
It is possible to determine whether 61 percent of the information taken in during a conversation is communicated through nonverbal signals.
c
The study of verbal and nonverbal communication is an area where one cannot expect great precision in one's research results.
d
Some sciences can yield mathematically precise results that are not inherently suspect.
e
If inherently suspect claims are usually false, then the majority of claims made by scientists are false as well.

From PrepTest 123 Answer and explanation →

In this case, the authors' names don't give us any clues about what to expect. The names are there to make it clear that this is a conversation between two people and to let us reference each set of claims.

To sum up, the stimulus is always a set of claims that we're required to analyze. It might be a series of neutral facts or it might be an argument designed to persuade. It might have an implicit author, a single named author, or two named authors. In every case, though, our task is going to be to assess those claims in some way.

How we go about assessing them depends on the question stem.

The question stem

The question stem poses a question about the stimulus. It's the thing we need to answer.

The test can pose a wide range of questions about a stimulus, but they all have one thing in common: they test you, in different ways, on how a set of claims can (or can't) be used to support a given conclusion. Sometimes, the question stem will have you drawing conclusions yourself, like in the Spanish 101 example, where the question stem asks us what can be "properly inferred" (a fancy way of saying "concluded") from the facts in the stimulus.

21.

Which one of the following statements about the students who took Spanish 101 at the university last semester can be properly inferred from the information above?

This question stem asks what we can infer from the stimulus.

a
At least some of the students who received a grade of A minus or higher attended every class session.
b
Most, if not all, of the students who missed at least one class session received a grade lower than B minus.
c
Most of the students received a grade higher than B minus.
d
At least one student who received a grade of B minus or higher missed one or more class sessions.
e
More than half of the students received a grade of B minus or higher.

From PrepTest 141 Answer and explanation →

Other times, when the stimulus features an argument, it's the author who's attempting to draw some conclusion from a set of supporting claims. In these cases, your job will be to scrutinize the reasoning underlying that argument.

For example, in the question with the marketing consultant, we're asked to describe how the argument is "vulnerable to criticism," or in other words, how the author uses flawed reasoning to reach her conclusion.

15.

The marketing consultant's reasoning is most vulnerable to criticism on the grounds that

This question stem asks for a flaw in the argument.

a
it takes for granted that LRG's sales would not have been lower still in the absence of the competitor's advertising campaign
b
it fails to consider that economic factors unrelated to the advertising campaign may have caused LRG's low sales figures
c
it takes for granted that in LRG's industry, new products should outsell established products
d
it takes for granted that the higher sales of established products are due to effective advertising
e
it confuses a condition necessary for increasing product sales with a condition that will ensure increased sales

From PrepTest 141 Answer and explanation →

When the stimulus has multiple authors, the question stem often asks us to use their claims to draw a conclusion about what, precisely, the authors agree or disagree on. In the example with Taylor and Sandra, we're asked to identify the point of disagreement.

16.

The statements above provide the most support for holding that Sandra would disagree with Taylor about which one of the following statements?

This question stem asks for a point of disagreement between two authors.

a
Research might reveal that 61 percent of the information taken in during a conversation is communicated through nonverbal signals.
b
It is possible to determine whether 61 percent of the information taken in during a conversation is communicated through nonverbal signals.
c
The study of verbal and nonverbal communication is an area where one cannot expect great precision in one's research results.
d
Some sciences can yield mathematically precise results that are not inherently suspect.
e
If inherently suspect claims are usually false, then the majority of claims made by scientists are false as well.

From PrepTest 123 Answer and explanation →

All told, there are 22 different types of question stem. They all boil down to questions about how certain claims support certain conclusions.

Once we've read the question stem and considered the claims in the stimulus, all that remains is to choose one of the answer choices.

The answer choices

Every LR question has five answer choices listed from (A) to (E).

On some questions, it might seem like more than one of the answer choices are correct. Don't be fooled. There is only ever one right answer. At the end of the day, our job is to find the right answer and avoid getting duped by the other four.

Sometimes two choices look equally correct because they're saying the same thing in different words. If that's the case, you can cross them both off. Since there's only one correct answer, any duplicates must be wrong.

More often, though, you'll find that two attractive answer choices will have different meanings. When that's the case, it means you've misread or misunderstood something, either in the stimulus or in the answer choices themselves. Reread each one and get clear on what, precisely, they're saying. Consider whether you're adding any of your own assumptions to make either of the answer choices "work." Reading with precision and being aware of your assumptions are the best ways to tell a wrong answer from a right one. If that still doesn't work, you should simply make a call: choose one of the answers, flag the question, and move on. Wasting a lot of time on a question is worse than getting it wrong. Come back to the question after you've answered everything else. Sometimes a fresh look is enough to catch a key detail you'd missed the first time around.

One passage and all 6 of its questions, from PrepTest 123. A real Reading Comprehension section has four passages like this one, in 35 minutes.

Passage

In a recent court case, a copy-shop owner was accused of violating copyright law when, in the preparation of "course packs"—materials photocopied from books and journals and packaged as readings for particular university courses—he copied materials without obtaining permission from or paying sufficient fees to the publishers. As the owner of five small copy shops serving several educational institutions in the area, he argued, as have others in the photocopy business, that the current process for obtaining permissions is time-consuming, cumbersome, and expensive. He also maintained that course packs, which are ubiquitous in higher education, allow professors to assign important readings in books and journals too costly for students to be expected to purchase individually. While the use of copyrighted material for teaching purposes is typically protected by certain provisions of copyright law, this case was unique in that the copying of course packs was done by a copy shop and at a profit.

Copyright law outlines several factors involved in determining whether the use of copyrighted material is protected, including: whether it is for commercial or nonprofit purposes; the nature of the copyrighted work; the length and importance of the excerpt used in relation to the entire work; and the effect of its use on the work's potential market value. In bringing suit, the publishers held that other copy-shop owners would cease paying permission fees, causing the potential value of the copyrighted works of scholarship to diminish. Nonetheless, the court decided that this reasoning did not demonstrate that course packs would have a sufficiently adverse effect on the current or potential market of the copyrighted works or on the value of the copyrighted works themselves. The court instead ruled that since the copies were for educational purposes, the fact that the copy-shop owner had profited from making the course packs did not prevent him from receiving protection under the law. According to the court, the owner had not exploited copyrighted material because his fee was not based on the content of the works he copied; he charged by the page, regardless of whether the content was copyrighted.

In the court's view, the business of producing and selling course packs is more properly seen as the exploitation of professional copying technologies and a result of the inability of academic parties to reproduce printed materials efficiently, not the exploitation of these copyrighted materials themselves. The court held that copyright laws do not prohibit professors and students, who may make copies for themselves, from using the photoreproduction services of a third party in order to obtain those same copies at lesser cost.

Question 1

Which one of the following most accurately states the main point of the passage?

Question 2

In the first sentence of the second paragraph, the author lists several of the factors used to determine whether copyrighted material is protected by law primarily to

Question 3

The copy-shop owner as described in the passage would be most likely to agree with which one of the following statements?

Question 4

The information in the passage provides the most support for which one of the following statements about copyright law?

Question 5

Which one of the following describes a role most similar to that of professors in the passage who use copy shops to produce course packs?

Question 6

Which one of the following, if true, would have most strengthened the publishers' position in this case?

Anatomy of a Reading Comprehension (RC) question

Let's take a look at the other category of LSAT question: Reading Comprehension (RC).

Which one of the following most accurately states the main point of the passage?

a
A court recently ruled that a copy shop that makes course packs does not illegally exploit copyrighted materials but rather it legally exploits the efficiency of professional photocopying technology.
b
A court recently ruled that course packs are protected by copyright law because their price is based solely on the number of pages in each pack.
c
A court recently ruled that the determining factors governing the copyrights of material used in course packs are how the material is to be used, the nature of the material itself, and the length of the copied excerpts.
d
A recent court ruling limits the rights of publishers to seek suit against copy shops that make course packs from copyrighted material.
e
Exceptions to copyright law are made when copyrighted material is used for educational purposes and no party makes a substantial profit from the material.

From PrepTest 123 Answer and explanation →

Right off the bat, we can see that the passage is much longer than an LR stimulus. This is the Reading Comprehension section, after all, so naturally the LSAT gives you a lot to read.

Or does it?

Each RC section only requires you to endure four passages. For each passage, you'll answer a series of five to eight questions about the content of that passage. If you were to split a passage up into five to eight equally sized portions and divide those smaller portions among the questions, you'd find that those passage portions are a very similar length to an LR stimulus. So RC questions don't actually make us read more than LR questions do. For RC, we just need to do more of the reading up front.

Besides the long passage, the rest of the question page is quite similar to an LR question. You have a question stem and a set of five answer choices. Let's look at each in a little more detail.

The passage

No fancy "stimulus" lingo here. We just call the passage "the passage." (If only everything about the LSAT were so simple.)

RC passages pull from a wide range of subject matter including law, the humanities, and the natural and social sciences. You'll see passages about UN treaty guidelines, jazz musicians, black holes, and the economics of video games. Pretty much anything is on the table. But you're not expected to have any background knowledge about the topic at hand. Anything you need to know about subject matter in the passage will be told you by the passage. Your job is to understand what, precisely, the passage is telling you.

Most passages are by a single author who's trying to make a point. That point might be that certain UN treaty guidelines are flawed and need improvements. Or it might be that a notable jazz musician is misunderstood by his critics and should be reexamined in a different light.

Most passages are by a single author trying to make a certain point.

Which one of the following most accurately states the main point of the passage?

a
A court recently ruled that a copy shop that makes course packs does not illegally exploit copyrighted materials but rather it legally exploits the efficiency of professional photocopying technology.
b
A court recently ruled that course packs are protected by copyright law because their price is based solely on the number of pages in each pack.
c
A court recently ruled that the determining factors governing the copyrights of material used in course packs are how the material is to be used, the nature of the material itself, and the length of the copied excerpts.
d
A recent court ruling limits the rights of publishers to seek suit against copy shops that make course packs from copyrighted material.
e
Exceptions to copyright law are made when copyrighted material is used for educational purposes and no party makes a substantial profit from the material.

From PrepTest 123 Answer and explanation →

Some passages, though, are by two different authors. Each RC section includes one comparative reading passage split into two mini-passages by separate authors. They pose the extra challenge of keeping track of what each author has to say.

Passage A

Research concerning happiness and wealth reveals a paradox: at any one time richer people report higher levels of happiness than poorer people in the same society report, and yet over time advanced societies have not grown happier as they have grown richer. Apparently, people are comparing their income with some norm, and that norm must be rising along with actual income. Two phenomena—habituation and rivalry—push up the norm.

…

Passage B

Does the Solnick and Hemenway study mean that we care most about one-upmanship? Perhaps out of our primeval past comes the urge to demonstrate our superiority in order to help ensure mating prospects, keeping our genetic lines going. Still programmed like this, we get unexplainable pleasure from having a bigger house than our neighbors.

…

Some passages are divided between two authors, each making a different point.

15.

Both passages are primarily concerned with explaining which one of the following?

a
the human desire to create value
b
the relationship between income and happiness
c
the biological basis of people's attitudes toward wealth
d
the human propensity to become habituated to wealth
e
the concept of "required income"

From PrepTest 141 Answer and explanation →

Whichever kind of passage you're presented with, you'll be given a series of questions related to that passage. As with LR, the objective of each question is given by the question stem.

The question stem

The question stem poses a question to test your understanding of the passage material. It might ask you about the author's overall main point, like in the example below.

Which one of the following most accurately states the main point of the passage?

This question stem asks for the author's main point.

a
A court recently ruled that a copy shop that makes course packs does not illegally exploit copyrighted materials but rather it legally exploits the efficiency of professional photocopying technology.
b
A court recently ruled that course packs are protected by copyright law because their price is based solely on the number of pages in each pack.
c
A court recently ruled that the determining factors governing the copyrights of material used in course packs are how the material is to be used, the nature of the material itself, and the length of the copied excerpts.
d
A recent court ruling limits the rights of publishers to seek suit against copy shops that make course packs from copyrighted material.
e
Exceptions to copyright law are made when copyrighted material is used for educational purposes and no party makes a substantial profit from the material.

From PrepTest 123 Answer and explanation →

Sometimes, the question stem will ask you for information that's directly stated in the passage. Many times, though, you'll be asked about things that aren't stated outright, only implied by the author's claims.

The information in the passage provides the most support for which one of the following statements about copyright law?

This question stem asks for what's implied by the passage.

a
Copyright law can be one of the most complex areas of any legal system.
b
Courts have been inconsistent in their interpretations of certain provisions of copyright law.
c
The number of the kinds of materials granted protection under copyright law is steadily decreasing.
d
New practices can compel the courts to refine how copyright law is applied.
e
Copyright law is primarily concerned with making published materials available for educational use.

From PrepTest 123 Answer and explanation →

There's a total of 19 different types of RC question stem.

The only thing we haven't talked about yet are the answer choices, so let's do that.

The answer choices

As with LR, every RC question has five answer choices. Students often feel that RC answers are subjective, and that more than one answer choice would be a suitable response to the question stem.

But, again, there is only one right answer. An attractive wrong answer choice might be correct except for one small detail—often, a misrepresentation of the passage. If two or more answer choices look right, it's because you're misreading something, either in the passage or right there in the answer choices.

Sample LSAT Practice Questions

Question 1

Question 2

Question 3

Question 4

Question 5

Question 6

Question 7

Question 8

Anatomy of a Logical Reasoning (LR) question

The stimulus

The question stem

The answer choices

Question 1

Question 2

Question 3

Question 4

Question 5

Question 6

Anatomy of a Reading Comprehension (RC) question

The passage

The question stem

The answer choices

Frequently asked questions

Are these real LSAT questions?

How many questions are on the LSAT?

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