Video summary
The video features a college counselor named Meum who conducts an in-depth comparison of five digital SAT practice test services: Princeton Review, SuperTutor TV, Test Innovators, The SAT Crash Course, and Score Smart. He evaluates each platform based on three main criteria: the quality and accuracy of the questions, how well they simulate the official Blue Book testing environment, and the overall value for money regarding quantity of tests provided. His primary goal is to help students determine which service offers the best preparation without wasting resources on ineffective or overly expensive options that do not accurately reflect the real exam experience.
Princeton Review received a harsh critique due to significant flaws in its interface and question design; specifically, the "mark for review" feature was broken during testing, and some answer explanations were contradictory or factually incorrect regarding linguistic details. The reviewer also noted that the questions seemed intentionally designed to be unfairly difficult to lower scores and encourage purchasing more prep materials, resulting in a poor value rating despite offering only three tests at $300 total. SuperTutor TV was praised for having high-quality, challenging questions with an excellent Blue Book simulation but received criticism because its difficulty level fluctuated unpredictably between modules, making it hard to gauge true performance. While the interface worked well and included helpful features like easy/hard module selection, the inconsistent difficulty led to a slightly lower value score compared to competitors.
Test Innovators emerged as a strong contender with ten full practice tests available for $20 each plus access to thousands of additional questions in their bank, offering exceptional quantity and decent quality that closely mimics real exam conditions including data visualizations. The SAT Crash Course took the top spot by matching Test Innovators' test count but surpassing them with superior features such as video explanations for every answer choice rather than just text-based notes. Additionally, using a specific promo code provided an extra 20% discount on their package, making it the most cost-effective option available while maintaining a flawless simulation of the official testing interface without any bugs or missing features found in other apps.
In his final ranking, Score Smart was placed fourth due to issues with its user dashboard navigation and lack of detailed answer explanations for incorrect responses, despite offering a free initial test which is appreciated by users looking to try before buying. The counselor concluded that while Princeton Review offers the worst value and SuperTutor TV provides high-quality but inconsistently difficult questions, Test Innovators stands out as an excellent budget-friendly alternative with vast question banks. Ultimately, he crowned SAT Crash Course as the best overall choice because it combines perfect interface simulation, comprehensive video reviews for answers, a large number of tests, and unbeatable pricing when using promotional codes to secure significant savings.
Read the full video transcript
hello my people my name is meum I'm your
college counselor and today we're going
to compare five digital SAT practice
test Services I'm going to put them
against each other and figure out which
one is the best value for your money and
which ones are going to help you prepare
better for the SAT we're going to look
at score smart test innovators
supertutor TV the Princeton Review and
the sat crashcourse decom who I got to
admit is a sponsor of this video we're
going to look at the quality of the
tests how much they simulate the digital
sat environment and like how accurate
the questions are quantity of tests how
much material are you getting and of
course the value what are you getting
for your money which program offers you
the best value for the purposes of this
we're just looking at self-guided
programs where you get practice tests
you take them when you want and that's
it I want to start with the Princeton
Review because they're one of the
biggest names in this space and I feel
like it's one of those that people will
look for first and then there's the
digital sat self-paced course that's
what was paid for here I think I got to
go to practice up here at the top let's
take a look at test two we can choose if
we want to be time time and a half or
double time people who have uh you know
extra considerations for the digital sat
can get extra time if they have like
diagnosed learning difficulties but
we'll go ahead and just do the regular
timed exam here and I'm going to start
doing the English portion the interface
feels pretty blue Booky it looks
basically the same I think that's pretty
good we've got our review page feature
down here with all the questions and I
can go to the review page that's that's
cool okay and I can go back and I can
flag for review I'm just testing out all
these things okay um interesting that's
not working when I click on Mark for
review it doesn't work okay can I mark
it for review now
no how do I mark it for review
apparently Mark for review doesn't work
as you can see I am clicking and
clicking and clicking and clicking Mark
for review is broken I can zoom in and
out like I normally would which I like
cuz I do always encourage you to zoom in
and out on these questions The
annotation features are here again
that's a complete waste of time don't
ever use those this hard module
introduced some kinds of questions that
I didn't see in the first module for
example we have a sentence function
question here and we're also looking at
a paired passage question here which
were not previously in the first module
in the first module we had like six note
taking questions at the end module 2
only has one note taken question so
that's definitely a good example of how
they've been diversifying some of the
difficulty here overall I would say this
second module has been harder okay so
reading and writing was 660 I got a
little bit lazy towards the end okay so
module one I had three Incorrect and on
module two I had five okay so we have
question explanations which I do
appreciate on this tool like I'm getting
information about why my answer was
wrong I can see why why this would be an
additionally like I think that's a good
explanation note- taking questions here
there were a couple of these that felt
pretty like subjective to me this one
says introduce Maya Darren and her film
meshes of the afternoon so because it
asked me to introduce both both I looked
for an answer that had information about
both this one just asked me to introduce
the film not its director so each of
these three mentioned the director but
it wasn't specifically asking me to
introduce the director it's inconsistent
like if you're going to ask me to
introduce the film and the director and
then I get it right when I do that and
then you only ask me to introduce the
film and I get it wrong when I do that
then there's something off see this is
wrong like tonal languages enunciate
words and phrases using pitching no they
distinguish words and phrase using pitch
changes I'm a freaking linguist I
studied language education this is not
right this is actually wrong Princeton
reviews tests and I've seen this before
when they were on paper they're designed
in a way to be unfairly hard which gives
you a lower score which encourages you
to pay more for Preparation but I will
say I like the way that this is
presented this is a good breakdown of
your scores when it comes to quantity
Prince review gives you three full tests
you're going to spend $300 to get three
full tests which makes Prince riew one
of the worst values that we're going to
look at today considering the SAT itself
only costs like $100 to take like you
could literally just take the damn test
instead of going here and doing this and
it would cost you about the same
considering the quality of the prince
and review test I've given it a seven
out of 10 due to the issues with marking
questions for review and some of the
issues with the answer explanations and
the nitpicky wrong answers that have
contradictory explanations quantity
honestly I'm going to give it a four out
of 10 I feel like three full practice
tests is okay but you know know you
could be doing better this has to be one
of the worst values in the entire Market
$100 per test makes this one of the most
expensive and really that's a ripoff I
would never recommend you spend $100 per
test just to get three practice tests
like honestly there's way better
Alternatives out there next up we're
going to look at supertutor TV which is
also a very popular YouTube channel and
one of the few that I actually have a
lot of respect for cuz I think they
cover some really important topics and
they do it in a very professional way
and not the sensationalist way that some
other channels like to talk about sat
topics with BS videos like what's going
to be on the March sat you don't work
for college board you don't know they
have four tests they have the one main
mock practice test and they said three
more by early 2024 and I can confirm
that those are there I'm going to grab
the reading and writing complete section
I see I can choose the different modules
if I want to go back and look at like
the easy module or the hard module I
think it's nice that they give you that
option same basic message I see when I
open up blue book we've got our
Eliminator mode it works basically the
same cool uh we can mark for review that
does seem to work here and then it is
shown up here okay cool so this looks
like a very faithful representation of
the blue book app uh zooming works
correctly look at how it scales the text
look at how fills my screen look it
adjusts this is great this is what you
want this one question is a little bit
awkward like this is a graph question
that's asking you to complete the
sentence but they're giving you the
whole sentence here as the question
instead of just asking you which one
completes the text and putting that text
down below and for some reason the text
is in this odd inverted color box um not
quite sure why they're structuring this
question this way I haven't really ever
seen one on the digital sat look like
this first module is done here and I
just want to say this is so far the
hardest first module I think I've ever
seen in any practice material I usually
can get through a first module in like
15 minutes at most I can appreciate a
test that wants to push you and go
harder than maybe the real things so
that you're more well prepared but at
the same time I kind of felt like it was
unnecessarily difficult in a few cases
second module was actually easier than
the first which concerns me a little bit
it makes me wonder if I got an easy
module okay so I got 720 so I must have
gotten the hard module they've marked
all the ones that I got wrong for review
as a way to kind of tell me to go do
those that's nice I guess they don't
really break it down by module here they
just have like let me see if I go to
reading and writing does it split it up
no so it just gives me all the total
questions that I got it doesn't tell me
like where the module ends which is
after 27 but still it's like it'd be
nice if you could split those up maybe
for Me overall I would say the questions
that I missed were hard questions they
were literature questions some of them
had some small subjective differences
but overall I don't really have any
major problems with the design of the
questions themselves I feel like these
questions were good questions albeit
very hard ones if you're looking to
challenge yourself supertutor TV's
questions are really good they are
strong challenging questions I would say
their quality rating is the best so far
I'm going to give him an8 out of 10 I
only would take a little bit of points
off just because I felt like the
difficulty was a lot harder than what
I'm normally used to seeing for typical
digital SAT practice for quantity I'm
going to give them five out of 10 now
when talking about the value that you're
getting from supertutor TV they do
include some extra stuff one two maybe
three sets of practice for any of these
given areas but I don't feel like we're
getting a lot of extra material for the
money average here is about $40 a test
if we're getting four practice test
you're not getting as bad of a deal as
something like Princeton Review where
you're paying $100 per test but you are
still paying a lot of money for these
tests and you're not getting a whole lot
more for it so I'm going to put the
value down here at 4 out of 10 next up I
want to talk about test innovators I
honestly don't know much about these
guys but their website says right here
that they have SAT prep for Success
initial Impressions like this is pretty
close to what I see in Blue Book
Eliminator right next to it could lead
to maybe some accidental misclicks cuz
that's why it's nicer to put it on the
right I do got to click the actual
letter I can't just like click the word
or the whole area so I got to like pay
attention to my clicks here a lot there
is that option to flag it for coming
back later I do like the way they've put
this bar up here I actually think that's
a little bit better even zoom in and out
but it's not adjusting the way that the
text is being presented so if you'll
notice what's happening here like it's
not adjusting where the text is
displayed it's not necessarily changing
the number number of words in a given
line there is some sort of annotation
tool here so I can highlight stuff and
then click to erase I'm not saying like
a perfect simulation of blue book but
it's got most of the things you need I
also like that there's this quick pause
in case I want to just come back later
that's kind of a nice feature this right
here is a good example why it gets a
little bit annoying when they don't
scale stuff like you can see I'm trying
to like expand this window so that it
should fill more space on the right here
and the size of this text is huge so
like the questions taken up tons of
space on my screen I got to go all the
way down here and now I can't see the
notes like I want to be able to see
everything all at once I like that it
gives me this clear indication of
getting the hard module like that's a
really nice touch I also like that they
kind of break things down by easy medium
hard difficulty it says I had seven hard
questions and I got one of those wrong
and I had 13 medium questions and one of
those was wrong I like this little Gant
chart kind of vibe where they're telling
me how much time I spent on them and
it's sort of helping me visualize how
long it took me take a look at some of
these questions that I got wrong ooh
they even give you the percentages of
the questions that people marked so I I
got a couple of issues with some of
these questions not too many I think for
the most part these are pretty good and
I would say I would recommend this
product I'm going to say seven also for
the quality of the test on test
innovators questions feel very similar
to what I see on the real digital sat a
lot of data visualizations and they're
adding a lot of extra features Blue Book
simulation isn't quite as good as the
real thing and it's not quite as good as
the other ones I've seen so far when it
comes to quantity this is like a seven
out of 10 you've got 10 full tests but
even if you only pay for one test you're
going to get access to those thousands
of questions that they have in their
bank and I'm going to give them a seven
on the value too I think that this is a
pretty solid deal I would honestly
encourage a lot of people to check out
that $49 option like I think to get one
full test and access to all those
questions for 50 bucks for a year is a
pretty good value that takes me to the
SAT crash course.com this video is
sponsored by them and I want to be fully
transparent with everybody here I am not
going to rate any company better just
because I work with that company or they
have sponsored any of these videos the
value and the quality and the quantity
like all three things are good across
the board and I think that they're
probably the most solid option for you
currently they're focusing on their 10
most popular tests if you saw my video
before I mentioned that finding 20 since
I've done a lot of review on their
questions they're doing some reworking
with those other 10 tests and right now
they have a main package of 10 sat crash
course has made their first 10 tests
even better by making video explanations
for the answers so at any point in your
review of those 10 tests you can just
click solution video why each response
is right why each one is wrong you can
turn on the transcript subtitles here as
well and overall this is a really good
way to get an explanation for your
answers I feel like it's much better
than just a pile of text at the bottom
of the screen that can be a little hard
to process as far as the app design they
simulate the Blue Book environment
perfectly I did not see one missing
feature I've never encountered one bug
or glitch quantity again we're talking
about 10 practice tests here for 200
bucks if you buy them all together and
that brings me to the value proposition
here the only other company that can
compete on value here is test innovators
because they're selling 10 tests for
$1.99 so it's exactly the same price
basically $1 difference but here's where
it gets interesting if you use the code
score you're going to get an extra 20%
off your purchase when you're at the
satc crashcourse decom and that
definitely makes it the best value
that's out there if you can save 20% off
of this it's automatically the best
value you're not going to find a better
deal okay we are on our last service
it's called score smart now naturally
you would think that I'm going to be a
big fan of this one because it's got
score in the name that's the name of my
business also is score smart as awesome
as score test prep in College counseling
and would I recommend it for you we're
going to find out they offer one free
test that you can take right now which
is very cool I think it's really good
for everybody to get a free test so they
can see if they like the platform or not
this is the interface here when you log
in now I did buy this second digital SAT
test I had opened the first one for like
a minute and then I decided I wasn't
going to do it and then it basically
marked it as done for review so be
advised if you open anything here you
better be ready to take it and you
better be ready to say goodbye to your
$35 don't clear the browser so yeah
don't leave okay okay so we have some
instructions it looks like there's a few
different tips Eliminator mode works
fine Mark for review seems to be working
question number two does it show up down
there it does okay that's features how's
the scaling scaling is good we can zoom
in and out that's what I like to see I
have gotten to the end of the first
module here I feel like the first module
was pretty good for a first module
didn't feel too hard or too easy however
there is no review page it's kind of
like when you get to the end here it
straight up says you better like go back
and check until you know until you're
super ready to end module 2 is done some
of this stuff in the dashboard is a
little bit awkward to look at like I
feel like the the information here isn't
as clear as it could be it tells me that
okay I got only one wrong on the first
module and two on the second module
click on a circle to see more analysis
so let's take a look at that
report I feel like this should be easier
like it'd be nice if it just jumped me
straight to the questions and I could
look at them the way I do with most
things okay this is a ZIP file 1 minute
37 seconds later back close this out
review questions okay maybe that's where
I got to go okay so we missed number 11
on the first module that's the only one
let's go to question view that's got to
be okay finally here we go okay so not
easy to get to the questions and just go
straight to reviewing them if I'm just
looking to find the ones that I made a
mistake on like if I go to performance
by question right I see that 11 was
wrong I have to remember that 11 was
wrong like if I go here on question view
there's no indication that I missed any
of these questions it it just shows the
answer that I marked and I can check the
answer and it'll tell me if it's okay or
not okay so it's a green check if it's
correct it's going to be a little
awkward like like here I got to go and
click the answer okay I was between that
one and that one that seems fair I don't
see any explanations here I don't see
any like reasoning for why those answers
are right or wrong so that's kind of a
hit against this too the other thing is
I marked some of these questions for
review specifically cuz I kind of wanted
to go back and take a second look at
them because there were some questions
that I wasn't too sure about but that
hasn't been saved so like I can't go
back and check on some of those ones
where maybe I guessed so that kind of
brings down the quality ranking for me
I'd put it at like a 6 out of 10 I feel
like there's some missing features that
need to be added and the interface could
be a little cleaner and a little easier
to use and that would make this a much
better product so the value proposition
for score smart isn't bad I mean I'd
probably call it a four out of 10
because you're talking about $35 per
test which is still quite a bit it's
definitely not as bad as princet and
review which is God awful uh it's and
it's certainly better than super tutor
TV and there's more exams available but
there is no extra material and in order
to get a better deal on those tests you
have to go all the way up to like the
big package that gets them for $25 a
piece so I feel like score smart not a
bad deal but definitely not the best
option here let's just do a quick recap
here to close this out we've got our
five Services I'm going to start at the
bottom with the Princeton Review we've
got quality issues with the app only
three tests and an exorbitant price that
one is dead last and it's not even close
after that I'm going to put score Smart
in fourth place I think that while they
have a large number of tests in fact
more than anybody else that we've looked
at today there's some quality issues
user interface issues and the pricing
isn't great compared to some of the
other options out there I'll put super
tutor TV in third place I think they
have very high quality tests although
the difficulty is a little bit broken
and while they are more expensive than
something like score smart I think that
you're getting more value for your money
considering the fact that they do have
extra material and overall the interface
is an excellent simulation of blue book
in second place I have test innovator
their value is tough to beat you can get
10 tests for $20 a piece if you buy the
full package or you can just get one and
still get access to tons of extra
material the fact that test innovators
has all that extra material makes them a
really good value as well and I think
that the quality of their offering is
really good even if it's not a perfect
Blue Book Sim it's decent it's good
enough gets the job done in first place
I got to put the SAT crashcourse tocom
they have just as many exams as test
innovators but they've also got great
video solutions to their questions now
they've got an incredible value if you
use the code score when you check out
you're going to get a better deal there
than you will anywhere else their Blue
Book simulation is simply perfect
there's not a single flaw with it I can
honestly say that sat crashcourse decom
has built a fantastic product if you're
interested in learning more about them
you can go to the SAT crashcourse outcom
you can use the promos scored C promos
scored you can use the promo code score
at checkout to get 20% off hopefully you
found this helpful if you have any
experiences with some of these companies
and you want to share them please do in
the comments below I would love to hear
what you think about these Services
especially if you've used more than one
it would be great to get your input
thank you so much for watching this and
I'll see you next time