SHL Verify Interactive: The Tests and How to Prepare

If your SHL invitation says "Verify Interactive", you are taking one of SHL's newer reasoning tests. They look different from the tests most prep guides describe: you move, build and arrange things on screen as well as pick answers. This guide covers the five reasoning and calculation tests in the family, from SHL's own factsheets, and how to prepare for each. For SHL's other tests, see our SHL tests overview.

What is SHL Verify Interactive?

It is SHL's suite of mobile-first ability tests. SHL describes them as interactive and activity-based, designed to run on any device including phones, and adaptive, which it says gives shorter tests, a more precise score, and makes them suitable to take unsupervised. On its cognitive assessments page, SHL describes the format as including drag-and-drop and gamified interactions, and the tests as automated and remotely proctored.

The five reasoning and calculation tests at a glance

From SHL's factsheets:

Numerical Reasoning: 18 minutes, up to 10 questions. Working with workplace data: creating charts and graphs and filling in spreadsheets. Aimed at mid-level roles.
Inductive Reasoning: 18 minutes, up to 15 questions. Spotting rules in shapes and alphanumeric sequences, then predicting what follows. Aimed at mid- to senior-level roles.
Deductive Reasoning: 18 minutes, up to 12 questions. Evaluating arguments, analysing scenarios and drawing logical conclusions, including completing a scenario from incomplete information. Aimed at mid-level roles.
Numerical Calculation: 10 minutes, up to 12 questions. Order of operations, quick calculations and spotting errors in a calculation. Aimed at entry-level roles.
G+: 36 minutes, up to 24 questions. A mix of deductive, inductive and numerical tasks, with a score for each plus a general ability score. SHL says it suits all job levels.

Every test is a single sitting. Your invitation shows which one you have and the time allowed, which is the figure to trust if it differs from the above.

SHL also lists Process Monitoring under the Verify Interactive name. It is one game-based simulation, 18 minutes on average, that measures how you respond to instrument feedback and keep a production process within safe control limits. SHL says it suits all job levels and names roles such as plant and system operators, manufacturing and quality assurance workers, train and truck drivers, and pilots. This guide doesn't cover it.

Cohesyve

Get used to being assessed before you sit SHL Verify Interactive

Cohesyve's practice runs are AI job simulations of the role you want, not copies of SHL Verify Interactive. They show where you lost marks. 3 free practice assessments, no card.

Start practising free →

What the tasks look like

The examples here are our own illustrations of each style. They are not SHL items, and the real interface will look different.

Numerical Reasoning. You get a small data set and act on it.

Our example: A table shows a team's monthly costs: rent $4,000, salaries $18,000, software $1,500, travel $2,500. Drag the bars to build a chart of each cost as a share of the total. Rent 15.4%, salaries 69.2%, software 5.8%, travel 9.6% of $26,000.

Inductive Reasoning. You find the rule and apply it.

Our example: A grid of tiles changes from left to right: a triangle pointing up, then right, then down. Each step also adds one dot. Place the next tile. A triangle pointing left with one more dot. Two rules run at once: a quarter-turn each step and one extra dot.
Our example: 2B, 4D, 8H, ...? 16P. The number doubles, and the letter is the letter at that position in the alphabet.

Deductive Reasoning. You work out what must follow from the information given.

Our example: Four meetings must fit into four slots. The budget review is before the hiring meeting. The client call is last. The design review is first. Which slot is the hiring meeting in? Slot 3. The design review takes 1 and the client call 4, and the budget review must come before the hiring meeting, so budget is 2 and hiring is 3.

Numerical Calculation. Short, quick arithmetic.

Our example: Which step in this working is wrong? 6 + 4 × 3 = 10 × 3 = 30. The first step. Multiplication comes first: 4 × 3 = 12, so the answer is 18.

How adaptive scoring changes your strategy

Because the tests are adaptive, the difficulty follows your performance, and each test stops at a small number of questions. Three things follow:

Every question counts. With a cap of 10 to 24 tasks depending on the test, each one carries real weight. Don't rush the early ones to save time for later.
Hard tasks are normal. If you are doing well, the tasks get harder. Feeling stretched is expected.
Finish what you start. SHL says Verify Interactive asks fewer questions thanks to its partial-scoring method, which suggests a partly completed task can still earn credit.

Results go to the employer. SHL's candidate support says only the person the company chose as results recipient can see them, and SHL cannot send you your scores. Many organisations offer feedback; SHL's advice is to ask if they don't.

How to prepare

Take the matching SHL Direct practice test. SHL's free practice site has interactive, mobile-enabled versions of the Numerical, Inductive, Deductive and General Ability tests. The numerical, inductive and deductive ones give you a report. This is the closest preview you will get of the drag-and-drop format, and SHL notes the practice difficulty may not exactly match the real test.

Learn the controls before the clock matters. The format is the main thing that's new. Practise dragging, placing and editing answers until you don't have to think about the interface.

For inductive tasks, check one property at a time. Rotation, count, shading, position, letter or number. Most sequences change one or two of these by a fixed rule.

For deductive tasks, write the constraints down. A quick list or grid on paper stops you holding everything in your head. Then place the items fixed by the rules first.

For numerical tasks, check units and periods. Most errors are a correct calculation on the wrong figure.

Choose your device deliberately. The tests run on phones, but charts, grids and spreadsheets are easier on a laptop. Run SHL's browser check before you start.

Ask for adjustments early. If you need extra time or another adjustment, tell the recruiter before you start. SHL's accessibility pages describe the support available.

Where Cohesyve fits

Reasoning tests are usually an early screen. After them, interviews and tasks from the job carry more weight. Cohesyve, which publishes this guide, runs practice job simulations for that stage, with a report on where you lost marks. It won't prepare you for SHL's tests; SHL Direct will. For the numerical test in more depth, see our SHL numerical reasoning guide.

Sources

Checked 21 October 2026.