Olivia | I scored 335 on the GRE as a non-native speaker. Let me show you how.

Sound familiar?

If any of this sounds like you...

You're not alone. This was me, two months before I scored 335.

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I've been studying for weeks. My mock score barely moves.

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I forget vocab words faster than I learn them.

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I run out of time on every section.

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I don't know if I'm doing this right or just wasting months.

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My test date is closer than I'd like.

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I'm scared I'll have to retake this. Again.

That was me, two months before I scored 335.

You're not stuck because you're not working hard enough. You're stuck because no one showed you what actually moves the needle.

Get the free 60-day plan

The exact plan I used to jump from 316 to 335

Why this matters

165 Verbal. English is my second language.

Let that sink in for a second. Verbal Reasoning is the section that destroys most non-native speakers. When I first opened a GRE practice set, there were so many words I had never even seen before. I couldn't understand what the question was asking, let alone get it right. Two months later, I scored higher on Verbal than 96% of all test takers. Including native speakers.

0 Verbal score (96th %ile)

0 Quant score (perfect)

0 Days of prep total

"When I saw the score at the end, 335, I wouldn't believe it. I almost cried. I just sat there for a couple minutes until a staff member walked over and said, 'You completed the exam. You feel free to leave now.'"

How I scored 335 on the GRE - Olivia's YouTube video

My story

I figured this out the hard way so you don't have to.

First Verbal 146

→

Two months later 165

Hi, I'm Olivia. I grew up in China and English has always been my second language. The first time I sat for the GRE I scored 146 on Verbal. Even with a perfect 170 Quant, my total was 316 and Verbal was the floor. I left the test centre convinced I just wasn't smart enough.

I gave myself two months. I was working a full-time job. The truth most prep companies won't tell you? More practice questions don't raise your score. I fell into that trap myself. What changed everything was reflection on my mistakes, understanding the patterns, and knowing where I was actually losing points.

"I had such a hard time even understanding a question, let alone getting it right. So many words I had never seen in my life."

That struggle is exactly why my method works, especially if English isn't your first language. I built it from that starting point. The plan I built is what I'm giving you for free below. The mistakes I made along the way? Those are what I help students avoid now.

Get the free 60-day plan Same materials I built for myself · free

Chinese background Non-native speaker Self-taught Full-time job 2-month timeline

The trap

More practice ≠ more points. Here's the trap.

Almost every student does this loop. Their score doesn't move for weeks. It's not their fault. No one tells them why volume isn't the answer.

01 Solve a question

→

02 Read the explanation

→

03 Think "got it"

→

A week later Same mistake. Again.

...and the loop repeats. Hundreds of questions later, the score is still where it started.

Volume doesn't fix it. Pattern recognition does. The fix isn't another 500 questions. It's reflecting on the 30 you already got wrong, finding the shape of the mistake, and never making it again.

Get the plan that breaks the loop

60-day reflection-first plan · free download

The method

Once I understood the trap, I built a system around it.

Here's exactly what worked. Three phases over 60 days. The reflection phase (Phase 2) is where your score actually moves. Most prep skips it entirely.

1 Foundation

Learn the landscape

Weeks 1 to 2

Get familiar with the exam. No surprises on test day. Build the vocabulary base that everything else sits on.

200 vocab words a day (sounds crazy but hear me out. It's about repetition rounds, not memorizing all 200 at once)
2 full verbal sets daily, structured exactly like the real exam
10 to 20 quant problems to keep the math sharp
Start building time awareness from day one

2 Reflection

This is where it actually happens

Weeks 3 to 6

Most people skip this. They just keep doing more questions. That's a trap. This is where your score actually moves.

Go through every single mistake from Phase 1
Identify your patterns. Vocabulary gaps vs. logic gaps.
Revisit your thought process: where exactly did you go wrong?
If your quant is already strong, switch to hard questions only
Do simple math in your head (the on-screen calculator is a time trap)

3 Peak mode

Sharpen & execute

Weeks 7 to 8

Final push. Writing templates, mock exams, and building the confidence to trust yourself on test day.

Build a flexible writing template that works for almost any issue topic
Prepare ~10 versatile examples you can adapt to anything
Take full mock exams under real conditions (don't make my mistake of waiting until the last week)
No new material. Only review and pattern reinforcement

The video that started it all

30,000+ people have watched this.

My first ever YouTube video. I just broke down exactly what I did, step by step. No fluff. People kept asking me to teach them, so now I do.

How I scored 335 on the GRE - watch on YouTube

30,000+ views • My first YouTube video

From the YouTube comments

What people are saying.

Real comments from the video. Go check for yourself.

"Great video! I really liked the way you explained everything, super clear and practical. This is going to be really helpful for me. I'm definitely going to follow all the tips and advice you shared."

AS

@adityashiwal186

YouTube comment

"Scored flat 300 (V 143, Q 157) on my official cold mock today. Aiming for 325 in 2 months. Super excited and motivated!"

UT

@ujyantramesh

YouTube comment

"Thanks Olivia! This is exactly what I was looking for. I have 57 days!"

W

@Woainhi

YouTube comment

Your free download

Get the exact plan I used to score 335

60-day study plan + 150 high-frequency word pairs + the reflection framework that actually moved my score. The same materials I used. Free.

60-DAY PLAN

Daily schedule

StudyMockReview

VOCAB PAIRS

Sentence equivalence

aberrant= deviant

brevity= terse

candor= frank

diffident= shy

ephemeral= fleeting

fortuitous= lucky

garrulous= talkative

60-DAY PLAN

GRE Starter Kit

by Olivia · 335 scorer

01Phase 1 · Foundation

02Phase 2 · Reflection

03Phase 3 · Peak mode

+150 vocab pairs

+AWA template

28 PAGES FREE

What's inside:

Full 60-day study plan, week by week, all 3 phases
150+ sentence equivalence word pairs grouped by theme
Daily vocab targets and practice set schedule
My reflection framework and essay writing template
The mistakes I made so you don't repeat them

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For when you want more

Want someone who's been there to guide you personally?

The plan above is everything I did alone. It worked, but it took me two months of figuring things out the hard way. If you'd rather skip the trial-and-error and have me look at your specific mistakes, your specific weaknesses, and build a plan around your test date, I work 1-on-1 with a small number of students.

Learn how tutoring works

Limited 1-on-1 spots • Trial lesson available on the tutoring page

FAQ

Questions I get a lot.

It's literally why I built it. I started Verbal prep barely understanding the questions. The vocabulary method is built around how non-native speakers actually retain words: high-frequency repetition rounds, not one-shot memorisation. The reflection framework works the same regardless of native language. If anything, non-native speakers see the biggest jumps because the structure was designed from that starting point.

More practice is the trap I described above. Magoosh, Princeton Review, every prep course gives you a mountain of questions. That's not what moves the score. The plan is built around the reflection phase: identifying patterns in your mistakes, fixing the underlying gap, and never making the same error twice. Volume comes second, and only after you've done the reflection work.

Yes. The plan is 60 days but it compresses cleanly. I'd cut Phase 1 (foundation) to a single week and weight more time on Phase 2 (reflection), which is where the points come from. The kit shows you exactly which weeks to compress and which to protect based on your timeline. Short timelines actually force the right behaviour: less volume, more reflection.

Realistic, yes. Easy, no. I jumped from 146 Verbal to 165 Verbal in two months. That's a 19-point jump on one section alone, while working full-time. Most people stuck at 300-310 are stuck because they're doing volume without reflection. Fix that and 320+ is on the table. The kit walks you through how.

You don't need to. I worked full-time during my 60 days. The plan is built around 2 to 3 focused hours, not 4 to 6 unfocused ones. The reflection sessions are short by design. What matters is the quality of those hours, not the count. If you're consistent with the right work, you'll out-perform someone grinding twice as long without a system.

Those are content libraries. They give you more questions, more videos, more material. The plan I'm sharing is a methodology, not a library. It tells you what to do with the questions you're already doing. You can run this plan on top of Magoosh, Gregmat, the official ETS materials, anything. In fact, that's exactly what I did.

If I can do it, you can do it too.

I went from a 316 total (146 Verbal) to 335 total (165 Verbal) as a non-native speaker, working full-time, in two months. Not because I'm gifted. Because I stopped doing volume and started doing reflection. The full plan I used is yours, free.

Get the free 60-day plan

Or learn about 1-on-1 tutoring →

60-day plan • 150+ vocab pairs • Free

More practice questions won't raise your GRE score. Here's what will.

If any of this sounds like you...

165 Verbal. English is my second language.

I figured this out the hard way so you don't have to.

More practice ≠ more points. Here's the trap.

Once I understood the trap, I built a system around it.

Learn the landscape

This is where it actually happens

Sharpen & execute

30,000+ people have watched this.

What people are saying.

Get the exact plan I used to score 335

What's inside:

Want someone who's been there to guide you personally?

Questions I get a lot.

If I can do it, you can do it too.

Book a free 30-minute trial lesson

Got it!