Negative marking on the Bocconi Online Test: when to guess and when to leave a blank

This guide is about the Online Bocconi test taken for bachelor and law programmes, in its standard and law forms. Applicants to Bocconi's Master of Science and MA programmes take a different form of the test with a heavier penalty and a lower floor; the last section covers it.

The rule, exactly as Bocconi states it

Bocconi publishes the scoring for the bachelor and law test as: "Right answer: 1 point. Missing answer: 0 points. Wrong answer: — 0.2 points." A separate, larger penalty applies to some critical-thinking items: "For questions of the 'critical thinking' area that give only three possible answer options, the penalty will be — 0.33 points."

This matters more than it looks. On the SAT, the ACT, the LSAT, the GMAT and the GRE there is no wrong-answer penalty at all, so the correct strategy on those exams is simple: never leave anything blank. On the Bocconi test that advice is wrong, and following it will cost you marks.

The arithmetic

Bocconi does not publish how many options most of its questions have; it mentions only that some critical-thinking questions have three. So the sums below show five, four and three options, and the conclusion holds for all of them.

Suppose a question has five options and you have no idea. You have a 1 in 5 chance of gaining 1 point and a 4 in 5 chance of losing 0.2:

$$E = \tfrac{1}{5}(1) + \tfrac{4}{5}(-0.2) = 0.2 - 0.16 = 0.04$$

Very slightly positive, but close enough to zero that it is not a strategy. Now eliminate one option, so you are guessing between four:

$$E = \tfrac{1}{4}(1) + \tfrac{3}{4}(-0.2) = 0.25 - 0.15 = 0.10$$

Eliminate two, and you are guessing between three:

$$E = \tfrac{1}{3}(1) + \tfrac{2}{3}(-0.2) \approx 0.333 - 0.133 = 0.20$$

The pattern is the point: every option you can eliminate roughly doubles the value of guessing. Elimination, not boldness, is what pays.

The three-option critical-thinking items

On the items Bocconi flags as having only three options, the penalty rises to 0.33. A blind guess there is:

$$E = \tfrac{1}{3}(1) + \tfrac{2}{3}(-0.33) = 0.333 - 0.22 = 0.11$$

Still positive, and eliminating a single option makes it a coin flip worth $0.5 - 0.165 = 0.335$. So the larger penalty does not make these questions ones to avoid; it makes them ones where a half-formed reason to discard an option is worth acting on.

What this means while the clock is running

The test gives you 75 minutes for 50 questions, which is 90 seconds each on average, and navigation is strictly forward-only: three questions appear per screen, and once you press Next you cannot return. You therefore cannot bank hard questions for later. Every question is answered or abandoned in the moment.

A workable policy:

1. If you can solve it, solve it.
2. If you cannot, spend a few seconds only on elimination, not on solving. Cross out what is impossible.
3. Eliminated at least one? Guess and move on.
4. Eliminated nothing at all? Leave it blank and move on. A blank costs nothing; a blind guess gains you on average 0.04 of a point on a five-option item, or 0.10 on a four-option one, which is rarely worth the seconds and the risk.

This policy is our advice, not a Bocconi rule; the scoring it rests on is Bocconi's.

One number that is an actual requirement

Bocconi publishes an eligibility floor: an applicant whose total score, penalties included, is below 17 is not considered in the selection. That is a published requirement, not a competitive average. It is also not a target — admission is by competitive ranking, in which the test contributes alongside your school grades — so clearing 17 means you are in the ranking, not that you are admitted.

Be careful with any other number you read online. Figures circulated as "the score you need for Bocconi" are almost always observed averages from unofficial sources, not published thresholds, and we do not repeat them.

The master's form scores differently

The Online Bocconi test for international graduate applicants — the master's form, with Verbal reasoning, Data insight and Quantitative reasoning areas — is also 50 questions in 75 minutes, but Bocconi gives its penalty as "Wrong answer: -0.25/-0.33 points", and its floor as "lower than 15 out of 50 will not be considered". Bocconi does not say which items carry −0.33, or how many options each question has.

The arithmetic above still applies, with a larger cost per wrong answer. Guessing between four options is worth $\tfrac{1}{4}(1) + \tfrac{3}{4}(-0.25) = 0.25 - 0.1875 \approx 0.06$; between three, $\tfrac{1}{3}(1) + \tfrac{2}{3}(-0.25) \approx 0.17$. Elimination matters even more here than on the bachelor test. Bocconi does not publish the navigation rule for the master's form, so the forward-only advice above is not assumed for it.

Practise the decision, not just the maths

The blank-or-guess call only becomes automatic with practice under the real scoring. Our timed Bocconi sets apply the −0.2 and −0.33 penalties, and the results show how many points your wrong answers cost you. See Bocconi Online Test preparation for the formats and a free test.