Free · 2 mock papers · One order to work them in
TMUA: Start Here
There are 1 full mocks published free on this site, 2 papers and 40 questions, plus a method library and a diagnostic. That is a lot to land on with no order to it. This is the order, dated backwards from the October sitting window.
- Nothing here is new material. Every link goes to a page already published on this site. This page is the sequence, not the content.
- The dates move with the calendar. Each phase is anchored to the sitting window, so the dates below are the ones for the current cycle rather than last year's. Confirm your own sitting on the official test page: this site does not run the test.
- Start late without panicking. If you are arriving part way through, the phase marked you are here is where to pick up. Do not try to catch up on everything you missed: work forward from today.
- The order is deliberate, and it is not the obvious one. The reasoning paper comes before the applications paper, for the reason set out below.
The plan
Seven phases, roughly twenty weeks. Each one names what you are trying to achieve, what to work through, and how to tell when you are done with it.
[01] · 25 May to 14 Jun 2026
Find out which of the two papers is your problem
Before any practice: read what each paper actually asks for, and get a baseline you can measure against later.
- TMUA Preparation: Two Papers, Two Different Skills
- Free TMUA Diagnostic: 15 Questions, Scored Instantly
Done when you have a diagnostic score written down, split by paper, and you can say which of the two is behind.
[02] · 15 Jun to 5 Jul 2026
Learn the reasoning before you drill the technique
Read the method library, then work one reasoning paper untimed. Paper 2 is the half school does not teach, so it is the half with the most room in it.
- The TMUA Method Library: Technique and Reasoning, Separately
- TMUA Mock Paper 2: Mathematical Reasoning
Done when you can negate a quantified statement, say what a counterexample has to do, and spot an argument that affirms the consequent, without looking any of them up.
[03] · 6 Jul to 26 Jul 2026
Paper 1 technique under the clock
Now build the speed. Work these in order and keep a note of every question where you found the slow route first.
Done when you can name the faster route on a question before you start calculating, more often than not.
[07] · 28 Sep to 11 Oct 2026
Taper
Nothing new. Re-read the methods, re-sit the diagnostic, and stop in time to arrive rested.
- The TMUA Method Library: Technique and Reasoning, Separately
- Free TMUA Diagnostic: 15 Questions, Scored Instantly
Done when you can state, from memory, the first thing you will do when a question does not yield in thirty seconds.
39 days until the October sitting window opens on 12 October 2026. Dates checked against the universities that publish them, in August 2026. Confirm yours on the official test page before relying on them.
Three things that decide the score
[01]
Paper 2 first
Paper 1 rewards fluency you are already building at school, so it improves slowly and steadily with practice. Paper 2 rewards a way of thinking school rarely teaches, so it improves quickly once someone shows you what it is. Working them in that order puts the early weeks where the return is.
[02]
Recognition beats calculation
Almost every question has a long route and a short one, and which you take is usually decided in the first ten seconds. That is what the method library is for: it lists the cue that should trigger each method before you have decided anything.
[03]
Read the options before the algebra
In a multiple-choice paper the options are information. A pair differing only by a sign tells you the examiner expects a sign error. A pair differing by a factor of two tells you where the halving goes. Reading the five first often eliminates three of them.