How much does a real IQ test cost?

A clinically administered adult IQ test in the United States typically costs between US$500 and US$2,500, depending on the practitioner, location, and whether the test is part of a broader neuropsychological evaluation. The cost covers the clinician's time (60 to 90 minutes for the test plus scoring and reporting), the per-use cost of proprietary test materials, and professional overhead. School-administered IQ tests for children are usually provided at no cost as part of an educational assessment. Online IQ tests range from free (this site, the Open-Source Psychometrics Project) to several hundred dollars for proctored online versions of clinical instruments.

This question comes up frequently from users of free online IQ tests and from people considering whether to pursue a clinical evaluation. The full answer depends on context — what the score will be used for, how recently the test was administered, and what other information is available. The brief answer above captures the broad consensus from the published research literature; the linked deep-dive articles cover the underlying evidence in more detail.

Related considerations include the standard error of measurement on the relevant test, the population the test was normed against, and the specific cognitive abilities the test samples. A score is much more informative when interpreted alongside these contextual variables than when reported as a bare number.

If this answer raises further questions, see the related FAQ entries listed in the sidebar and the longer-form articles on the same topic in the article library. The site is designed to provide layered depth: the FAQ entries offer concise answers, the deep-dive articles offer the underlying research, and the score-interpretation pages tie the abstract concepts to specific result bands.