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I'm aware that the mathematics GRE subject test largely tests calculus, linear algebra and a bit of algebra at the freshman or sophomore level. These constitute the firsgt two categories on the exam, mentioned in the official booklet available here. The third type of questions fall in the Additional Topics category. This catgeory includes questions on:

  1. Introductory real analysis: sequences and series of numbers and functions, continuity, differentiability, and integrability, and elementart topology of $\mathbb{R}$ and $\mathbb{R}^n$.

  2. Discrete mathematics: logic, set theory, combinatorics, graph theory, algorithms; and

  3. Other topics: general topology, geometry, complex variables, probability and statistics, and numerical analysis.

Like it or not, this ctageory constitutes 25% of the questions on the exam! I'm unsure of the best and effective way to go about preparing for this section. I suppose one has to do (extremely) well on this section of the test as well to score in the $85/90 +$ percentile range.

I'm well aware of the studying tips for the other portion of the exam; for one, pick up your calculus textbook and start practicing! I'd really appreciate if someone could outline a study plan to effectively prepare for the last portion of the exam, without assuming the student may have done all the topics (mentioned above) as coursework in college. It'd be great if you could mention some specific resources/books as well.

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Junaid Aftab
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  • Topology in both first and last category ? –  Apr 15 '17 at 10:54
  • @A---B Yes, see the link, pp. 3. I think the the first category refers to the study of metric spaces specialized of $\mathbb{R}^n$ and the category refers to the content taught in courses in point-set topology (which do of course overlap with the content mentioned above when one touches on meterizable topological spaces, complete metric spaces etc.). – Junaid Aftab Apr 15 '17 at 11:00
  • I think the last category is the toughest one. –  Apr 15 '17 at 11:17
  • @A---B I'm sure, hence it's a sub category of a category! Any response to my question, by the way? – Junaid Aftab Apr 15 '17 at 11:23
  • GRE Subject Test - Past Papers, Books, Advice – BCLC Apr 16 '17 at 20:24
  • The only thing I knew of those topics were the 1. prob and stat and 2. real analysis I learned in undergrad. Are you like me, from an applied maths background? I'm not sure much of the pure maths stuff will come out except real analysis. I think better time is spent focusing first on those tricky questions in precalc, calc (including calc 3!) and linear algebra, then on real analysis and then for any time left over I guess all that topology, abstract algebra stuff. If you see some of the solutions to past papers, you'll actually learn a little bit of abstract algebra or complex analysis... – BCLC Apr 16 '17 at 20:30
  • ...without referring to textbooks though it's not necessarily the case that you'll really understand it. – BCLC Apr 16 '17 at 20:31
  • @JunaidAftab How many tests did you have to practice for your test ?..... I only found 5 free online ..... is there anymore? – Emptymind Aug 03 '17 at 09:19

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