SAT or ACT in 2026: how to choose now that the ACT has changed
The most common question I get from a parent on a first call is which test their child should take, and the honest answer is that in 2026 the two tests are closer than they have been in years. Both are shorter than they used to be. Both are accepted everywhere. Both can be taken on a computer. The decision is still worth making deliberately, because a student who prepares for one and takes the other wastes months. Here is what the two tests look like as of September 2026, and how I would choose.
What each test is now
The digital SAT has been the only SAT since spring 2024. It is two hours and fourteen minutes: a Reading and Writing section of 54 questions in 64 minutes, then a Math section of 44 questions in 70 minutes. Each section is two modules, and the second module is easier or harder depending on how the first went. That adaptivity changes how you should study. The Desmos graphing calculator is built in and allowed on every math question. Scores run 400 to 1600.
The ACT changed in 2025, and the change reached school-day testing in spring 2026. The required sections are now English (50 questions, 35 minutes), Math (45 questions, 50 minutes) and Reading (36 questions, 40 minutes). That is 125 minutes for a composite, down from 175. Science is optional: it is still offered, still scored on its own, but it no longer counts toward the composite, which is now the average of English, Math and Reading. Math questions have four choices instead of five. Scores still run 1 to 36.
One consequence is easy to miss. The ACT was always the faster test, and it still is, but by less. Averaged over the whole section, the SAT gives a student about 70 seconds per Reading and Writing question and about 95 per math question. The ACT gives about 42 per English question and about 67 per reading or math question. A student who feels rushed on practice tests should feel that difference before choosing.
Does it matter which one you send
To the college, no. Every four-year college in the country that reads test scores accepts either, and none prefers one. A 1400 and its ACT equivalent are read the same way. The concordance table that maps one to the other is published jointly by College Board and ACT, and admissions offices use it.
So the decision is entirely about the student: which test they will score higher on, relative to each test’s scale, and which one they can prepare for in the time available.
The Ohio wrinkle
Every Ohio public school district gives one of the two tests to every junior each spring, paid for by the state, during the school day, with no registration. The district chooses the test, not the family, and it chooses in the fall before. The school counselor will know which one yours gives. Since spring 2025 a parent can opt a student out, but there is rarely a reason to: it is a free, real, official sitting.
What that means in practice is that an Ohio student will have a score on whichever test their district picked, whether or not it is the test they prepared for. If the district gives the ACT and the student is preparing for the SAT, that is fine, and the state-funded ACT becomes a useful second data point. But if a family has no preference between the tests, the one the school gives for free is a reasonable tiebreaker, because it comes with a guaranteed sitting on a known date. The spring 2027 windows are already posted: the ACT between February 23 and April 2, and the SAT between March 1 and April 30.
How I would decide
Not by personality. The advice that the ACT suits “fast readers” and the SAT suits “deep thinkers” is folklore, and I have watched it send students the wrong way. The only reliable method is to take both, under real conditions, and compare.
- One full official practice test of each, timed, at home, on different days. The SAT one is free in Bluebook; the ACT one is a free PDF or an online practice test from ACT. Here is how to take one so the score means something.
- Convert the ACT composite to an SAT score with the concordance table and put the two side by side. A difference of fewer than about fifty SAT points is noise. A difference bigger than that is a real signal.
- If the scores are close, ask the student which test they would rather spend forty hours on. That is not a soft question. Preparation is where the score moves, and a student who dreads one of the tests will do less of it.
- Then stop. Pick one and do not revisit it. Students who keep both tests alive prepare for neither.
What I would not do
I would not prepare for both at once. The overlap is real, especially in math and grammar, but the pacing, the question styles and the calculator strategy are different enough that the time is better spent going deep on one.
I would not pick the ACT to avoid “hard math”. The ACT math section reaches further into the curriculum than the SAT does, with more trigonometry and more geometry, and it does it at a faster clip. The SAT’s math is narrower and gives more time, which is one reason it rewards students who learn to use Desmos well.
And I would not treat the science section as a reason to avoid the ACT. It is optional now. A student who is strong at reading data can take it and send the separate score; a student who is not can leave it out, and the composite does not change.
My focus is the SAT, and most of my students take it, but I teach the ACT too, and the first thing I do with a family that has not decided is run the comparison above rather than steer them toward the test I know best.
Test formats and dates above are as of September 2026, from ACT’s description of the current test, ACT’s explanation of the 2025 changes, and the Ohio Department of Education and Workforce’s state-funded testing FAQ. Confirm your own district’s choice with the school.