Ace your exams.
Turn a big revision goal into a practical plan you can work on every week.
Start with what needs attention.
Choose a subject, a topic and a realistic target. Use a practice question to find out what you already know and where to focus next.
Your starting plan
- List the topics you need to cover using your exam board’s specification.
- Practise one topic without your notes, then mark your work.
- Schedule short sessions to revisit the gaps and check your understanding.
Support we’re developing
- Revision planning templates for GCSE and A-Level study
- Structured practice and reflection activities
- Progress checklists to help you stay consistent
These are proposed resources. Courses, predicted papers and coaching are not currently available to buy. Acing is not affiliated with an exam board and does not guarantee grades.
How to read your exam board specification
The specification is the document your exam is written from. Find your board and course code (for example, AQA GCSE English 8700), then download the specification from the board's website.
- Subject content: the list of what can be asked. Turn each bullet into a checkbox for your topic tracker.
- Assessment overview: how many papers, how long each lasts, how many marks, and the weighting. This tells you how to divide revision time.
- Command words: terms such as describe, explain and evaluate. Each asks for a different type of answer, so practise each one.
- Formulae and data sheets: check what is given in the exam so you only memorise what is not.
AQA says the specification lists the content and skills you are expected to have learned, which is why it is the best starting document for a topic tracker.
Building a weekly study routine
A routine removes the daily decision about whether to study. Anchor it to things that already happen.
- Choose fixed slots, such as straight after dinner, and use them on set days.
- Start each session with five minutes of recall from the last session.
- End each session by writing the first task for next time.
- Keep one slot a week for planning and one for catching up.
Put your phone in another room during blocks. Take a proper break after each one, away from screens.
Using past papers well
Past papers work best when used as diagnostics, not just practice. Early in the course, do individual questions on one topic. Closer to the exams, do full papers in timed conditions. AQA recommends practising under exam conditions to build exam writing skills.
- Mark with the mark scheme, and be harsh.
- Sort lost marks into knowledge gaps, misreading, and technique.
- Redo questions you lost marks on a week later.
Past paper finders usually show only the current specification, so make sure the paper matches your course.
Looking after the basics
Short, regular sessions are easier to keep up than rare marathon days. Plan meals, sleep and one free evening a week into the timetable at the start, not as rewards for finishing.
Turning the specification into a topic tracker
Copy the content list into a table with four columns: topic, confidence (red, amber or green), date last tested, and score from your last test. Update it after every session. The tracker answers the question every student asks, which is what to revise next. Start with red topics that carry many marks, because those give the biggest return per hour. Re-rate a topic green only after you answer exam-style questions on it without notes, not after reading it again.
Making notes you can actually test yourself with
Write notes as questions and answers rather than paragraphs. A line such as the cause of a process or the definition of a term, followed by a blank space for the answer, turns notes into a quiz. Keep one page per topic so you can cover the answers with a sheet of paper. Diagrams help for processes and sequences, but redraw them from memory rather than copying them.
Go deeper with our guides
Each of these guides goes into one part of exam preparation in detail:
- How to make a GCSE revision timetable, with summer 2027 exam dates and a worked weekly example.
- Revision techniques for A-Level and GCSE, including retrieval, spacing and past papers.
- Results day, resits and reviews, covering marking reviews, English and maths resits, and Clearing.
Free education tools
- Revision timetable generator — Weekly GCSE or A-Level plan from your exam dates, weighted to weaker subjects.
- GCSE & A-Level exam countdown 2027 — Days until summer 2027 exams, results days and each of your own papers.
- Flashcard maker — Paste notes, get question-and-answer cards. Download for Anki or Quizlet.