Is OMPT-B harder than OMPT-A? Yes. Here is by how much

Students ask me this question hoping the answer is "only slightly". I understand the hope. Most of them got assigned the B by an econometrics or business analytics programme after planning their summer around A-level effort, and 20 extra study hours is a real bill. But pretending the tests are near-equal produces worse outcomes than facing the difference in week one.

OMPT-A and OMPT-B side by side

Same spine, two extra limbs

Everything on the A appears on the B: numbers, algebra, linear and quadratic equations, systems, functions, exponentials and logarithms, differentiation. The chapter names match almost word for word on the two syllabus pages, and so do the topic counts, apart from the B's algebra chapter carrying 28 topics to the A's 26. So where does the difficulty live? In the two chapters the B bolts on, which between them carry 50 topics and, by the official weighting, 32% of the marks.

Trigonometry is the bigger shock for most of my students, because Dutch-style placement trig starts at radians and the unit circle rather than the triangle ratios many school systems teach. The B syllabus runs from right triangles through the unit circle, special values, the addition formulas and the sine and cosine rules to the trig functions with their transformations and inverses. If sin and cos are triangle buttons on a calculator to you, the trig drills will feel like a new language for about a week. That week is normal. Budget for it. (The A is not entirely trig-free: its differentiation chapter lists the derivatives of sin, cos and tan. It never asks the unit-circle work or the identities.)

Integration is more predictable but less forgiving. The B expects antiderivatives, the definite integral as area (between curves and solids of revolution included), and enough technique for substitution, integration by parts and quotients that need long division first. Either you recognise that the integrand is a chain-rule product or you do not. Start integration basics in week three at the latest.

The pace problem nobody prices in

150 minutes over 64 questions is about 2.3 minutes each, a number I make every B student write down. The A gives you the same per-question pace, but over a shorter sitting with easier extremes. On the B you hold that pace for two and a half hours across a wider syllabus, with no break of any kind (toilet included), which means fatigue becomes a scored skill. omptest.org says both tests aim mainly at the knowledge level of Bloom's taxonomy, so B questions are not individually deeper; there are simply more of them from more chapters.

In practice, the students who fail the B with decent maths are almost always pace casualties. They spend four minutes proving they can do a hard integral and then rush three algebra questions they could have banked in ninety seconds each. The fix is unglamorous: timed mixed sets, twice a week, from the second week of prep. A free timed B mock tells you your true pace in one afternoon; the OMPT-B hub lists the chapters in my teaching order.

Where OMPT-B points leak

You might expect the new chapters to dominate the damage, and for underprepared students they do. Among students who put in the hours, my marking notes tell a different story. The most common point sinks on the B are logarithm equations done slowly, chain-rule differentiation with an algebra slip in the middle, and trig equations where the student finds one solution and misses the rest of the family. Two of those three are shared-chapter problems. The B punishes shallow mastery of familiar material at least as hard as it punishes missing trig.

That table has a planning consequence: do not architect your whole schedule around the scary new chapters and leave the "known" ones to coast. My working split for a typical B student is roughly 60% of hours on the shared spine at full speed and 40% on trig and integration. Students who invert that ratio arrive fluent in integrals and lose the test in week-one material at question pace. The study planner builds the week grid from your test date.

What the cutoffs demand on each test

The cutoffs mostly do not get harsher on the B to match the harder test. VU asks 60% (a 5.5 out of 10) on the B for Econometrics and Operations Research and for Econometrics and Data Science. Groningen FEB asks 60% on the B for EOR and the same 60% on the A for its business programmes. Erasmus IBEB is the clearest case: 70% on the A or 60% on the B, first attempt only. AUC asks 70% on the B (or the G) for its Sciences major.

The exception is Maastricht, which sends me more B students than anyone. Its School of Business and Economics sets one benchmark for the whole school, 75%: so Econometrics and Operations Research, Business Analytics and Business Engineering need 75% on the B while International Business and EBE need 75% on the A. A score of 70 to 74% lets you ask the course coordinators for an exemption, you get three attempts, and the exam must be written by 15 August. Here you need the harder test at the same percentage. SBE's own page advises not to write the test before a trial score of at least 80%; I push B students to 85%.

One consolation for B candidates: the trig and calculus you build for the B is the working toolkit of a first-year econometrics curriculum, so every hour transfers to September. How pass marks work in general, including a score a few points under, is in OMPT passing scores explained.

How to decide when a programme accepts OMPT-A or OMPT-B

A handful of programmes accept either letter. Erasmus IBEB and its Dutch twin Economie & Bedrijfseconomie take the A at 70% or the B at 60%. VU's IBA, EBE and PPE take the A at 65% or the B or F at 60%, two attempts a year. University College Fryslân's Data Science & Society takes A or B at a 60% average with no 0% on any subsection. Turku accepts any variant. When the choice is yours, this is the procedure.

1. Write down both cutoffs from the programme page, not from memory. For Erasmus IBEB that is 70% on the A and 60% on the B, first attempt only, so a bad pick cannot be corrected.
2. Sit the free A mock under test conditions: 120 minutes, no breaks, basic calculator only. Record the overall score and the differentiation score.
3. Two days later sit the free B mock the same way. Record the overall score, then trigonometry and integration separately.
4. Compare each result with its own bar, not with the other test. An A mock at 62% is 8 points under a 70% bar; a B mock at 55% is 5 points under 60%. The smaller gap is the easier climb, provided the missing material is learnable in your time.
5. Put the answer in the score estimator with your weeks remaining and commit to one letter. Students who hedge across two syllabi arrive underprepared for each.

The branches in plain form. If your algebra is fast and your trig is cold, pick the A: the extra 10 points on the bar are cheaper than 50 new topics. If you have done calculus recently and integration does not frighten you, pick the B: a 60% bar on material you half-know beats a 70% bar on a shorter test where every algebra slip costs more. When both mocks land within five points of their bars, take the A. When neither is within 15 points, the letter matters less than the calendar; read the three-weeks section below first.

Two students, two answers

Student one holds an offer from Erasmus IBEB, took a business-track maths course that stopped at derivatives, and sits the two free mocks: 64% on the A, 41% on the B, with trigonometry at 20% and integration at 15%. The B gap is 19 points, almost entirely two chapters she has never met. The A gap is 6 points of speed on algebra she already knows. She prepares the A on timed sets for three weeks and books a slot that leaves 8 business days for grading before the ESE deadline. With one attempt allowed, the letter she can most reliably clear is the only sensible choice.

Student two has the same offer but finished a calculus course in the spring. His mocks come out at 66% on the A and 58% on the B, with integration at 70% and trigonometry at 45%. The B gap is 2 points; the A gap is 4. Trig is his only cold chapter, and it carries 15% of the B. He prepares the B, spends the first week on trig identities and trig equations, keeps integration warm with two timed sets a week, and treats the 60% bar as a floor rather than a target.

What to do if you were assigned OMPT-B with three weeks left

This is the email I get most in August, so the calendar arithmetic comes first. Standard grading takes up to 8 business days counted from the day after you submit, excluding weekends and Dutch public holidays; fast grading, €120 per attempt, brings that to 4. You must also schedule through ProctorU at least 72 hours ahead. So with a university deadline 21 days out, the last safe test day on standard grading is around day 9 or 10; with fast grading, about day 15.

If your diagnostic on the free B mock is 50% or better, three weeks is workable: about 25 hours a week reaches the official 100-hour estimate, and the schedule in how to prepare for OMPT-B in 4 weeks collapses to three by merging its last two weeks. Book day 14 or 15 with fast grading, and put trig and integration in the first ten days with the shared chapters as timed sets alongside.

If the diagnostic is between 35% and 50%, the odds on a first attempt are poor, and the question becomes whether your programme allows a second one. VU and Groningen cap attempts at 2 per year; Maastricht SBE allows 3; Erasmus IBEB counts only the first. With a retake available, sit a real attempt in week two, learn from the per-topic breakdown on the certificate, and use the second attempt in week three. With one attempt, follow the 2-week crash plan and test on the last possible day.

If the diagnostic is under 35%, or you cannot find 20 hours a week, ask the admissions office in writing whether a later result date is possible, and in the same email whether they accept the A. Purchased attempts stay valid until 30 September of the class year, so an attempt bought now survives a moved deadline.

If you get to pick your programme, should the test sway you?

No. I will take a position here: choosing a degree to dodge a placement test is trading four years to save four weeks. The B is a filter precisely because econometrics runs on this maths from the first semester. If the B looks impossible today, that is information about your starting point, and starting points move. I have watched students go from 40% diagnostics to a 78% pass in six weeks of steady work.

What the difficulty gap should change is your calendar. A students can often prepare well in four focused weeks; for the B I want six. Count backwards from your university's deadline, subtract 8 business days for grading and 3 for the booking notice, and book the slot before motivation has a chance to negotiate.