ASVAB MILITARY ENTRANCE EXAM Test That Defines Your Military Career The ASVAB stands for the Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery. It's a test that's designed to measure your potential in several academic and career areas. If you want to enlist in the military, you have to take it. It's the tool that all military branches use to see if you're qualified to serve and what military jobs you might be good at.
What Subjects Are Tested? The ASVAB is made up of nine subject areas: general science, arithmetic reasoning, word knowledge, paragraph comprehension, auto and shop information, mathematics knowledge, mechanical comprehension, electronics information and assembling objects.
Why Is The ASVAB Important? The ASVAB serves two functions: it determines if you meet minimum military entrance standards, and it is used to determine what military job you will perform.
When you get your ASVAB results, you'll get a sub-score for each area, plus several combined scores. The most important is your AFQT score, or Armed Forces Qualifying Test score. This score is a combination of your scores on the arithmetic reasoning, word knowledge, paragraph comprehension, and mathematical knowledge subsets. This score determines if you're qualified to enlist in the military. If your AFQT score isn't high enough, then you can't enlist.
Each branch has a minimum AFQT score. These are as follows: The Army: 31 The Marine Corps: 32 The Navy: 35 The Air Force: 36 The Coast Guard: 36 Most branches of the military also have an AFQT score requirement of 50 for recruits to be eligible for enlistment bonuses.
Your scores on the other sections of the ASVAB are used to determine what military jobs you're qualified for. Different combinations of scores from different subjects determine what jobs you get. For example, to get an office job, you may need a high combination of math and language section scores. To get a job as a mechanic, however, you may need high scores in math, auto and shop, mechanical comprehension, and electronics information. To get the widest range of jobs, you'll want to get the highest score you can get on each section of the ASVAB.