NZ Police Online Testing: the Ability Assessment and Personality Profile

Who runs the tests

NZ Police’s Online Testing page describes an Ability Assessment and a Personality Profile without naming either. It links to “practice tests on our provider’s website”, which is Podium’s candidate practice page, and it hosts a candidate preparation document written by Podium about Podium’s General Cognitive Ability Test, the GCAT. Podium is a New Zealand assessment company, and NZ Police also appears among the customer logos on Podium’s own home page. So the ability test is Podium’s GCAT, and the Personality Profile runs on Podium’s platform.

When you sit them

Online testing comes early, after your application. You receive an email from the recruitment team with the links and a five-day period in which to complete both tests. They are sat at home, online.

The Ability Assessment

• 60 multiple-choice questions in 30 minutes, one correct answer each. About 30 seconds a question on average.
• Verbal, numerical and abstract reasoning, mixed throughout rather than in sections, so you switch between words, numbers and shapes as you go.
• Adaptive. The questions adjust to your responses and get more challenging as you answer correctly. NZ Police says reaching difficult questions or making mistakes is expected and does not mean you are performing poorly, and that guessing or rushing at the end is not helpful.
• Proctored online. Images of you are taken at intervals while you work, to make sure you complete it on your own without other people, devices or tools, including AI. Anything unusual is checked by trained staff.

The Personality Profile

A 100-question multiple-choice questionnaire with no time limit, which NZ Police says should take about 15 minutes. Questions are short and there are no right or wrong answers. NZ Police asks you to answer quickly, honestly and as you are now, rather than as the officer you think you will become. It does not name the questionnaire. Podium’s own is the PQ10, which reports ten two-ended personality scales and checks for answers that look too good to be true.

If you do not pass

There is a minimum stand-down of six months before you can resit the Ability Assessment, and if you fail a second time your application is declined. NZ Police does not publish the pass mark, and it has said it no longer allows early resits. Prepare before you open the link rather than using the first attempt to see the format.

Some candidates also sit a separate literacy assessment (POST) after passing the online tests: those without NCEA Level 2 or higher literacy or an equivalent. We do not simulate it.

Practise the tests

• GCAT General Reasoning (NZ Police Ability Assessment) (60 questions · 30 minutes) - The Ability Assessment at full length: 60 mixed questions in 30 minutes, six options, adaptive, no going back. Sit this last, once the drills feel comfortable.
• GCAT Verbal Drill (20 questions · 10 minutes · free) - The verbal questions alone at the real pace. A practice format, not a separate test.
• GCAT Numerical Drill (20 questions · 10 minutes) - The numerical questions alone, without a calculator. A practice format, not a separate test.
• GCAT Abstract Drill (20 questions · 10 minutes) - The abstract questions alone: clock faces, rotating shapes and symbol sets, generated fresh every time.
• PQ10 Personality Profile (NZ Police Personality Profile) (100 questions · 15-20 minutes · free) - The Personality Profile: 100 statements on a five-point scale, ten to a page, untimed. No score to beat; a profile on ten scales.

Do Podium’s own free practice tests from the NZ Police page as well: they show the real screens, though they give no answers or scores. The format, the adaptive rule and how results are reported are covered on the Podium provider page, the test itself in NZ Police psychometric test: the Podium GCAT, and proctoring in can you cheat the Podium NZ Police test.