EY online assessment (Discover EY, internships, graduates)
Built by Cappfinity, SHL from 2027
- Format
- Discover EY, the first-year insight programme students call the EY spring week, has three steps: a short application form with no CV, the online assessment, and the programme itself, where the final day is assessed for a fast track to a summer internship interview. Up to the April 2026 intake the online stage was Cappfinity's: a strengths assessment of workplace scenarios ranked from the thing you would most likely do to the thing you would least likely do, or answered as a single pick, with sliders between two statements about how you work; then a job simulation of about 14 items built on emails, a news article about a fictional company and a few charts, mixing ranked scenarios, short written replies to a client or manager (about 1,000 characters), chart and table questions with a calculator, and two or three recorded video answers on your motivation and strengths, each with two or three minutes to prepare and two to answer, no retakes.
- Timing
- Untimed with the time recorded, in one sitting EY recommends doing on a laptop in Chrome; candidates report 45 to 90 minutes across the two parts, with the video answers the only clocked items. EY's FAQ for the 2027 cycle says the assessment will have a time limit stated in the invitation and lists the formats: choose from options, interpret a table, chart or graph, drag items into position, spot a pattern or apply a set of rules, record a video response. A score is produced for each assessment and mapped against set criteria; below the pass score the application is rejected without human review, and the video answers are scored by people. Adjustments, including up to 25 per cent extra time, must be requested before the assessment is started.
- What is uncertain
- EY never publishes the assessment. Everything above the FAQ's list of formats is candidate and prep site reporting of the Cappfinity version, and EY's early careers privacy notice, updated in September 2026, names SHL as the platform for the cycle now open, with a realistic job preview, a first online assessment covering teamwork and learning, and a behavioural skills test. No first-hand account of the SHL version exists yet, so the counts, the split between parts and whether first years get the numerical questions are reported, not stated. The student version in 2025 is reported without a separate numerical section; graduate versions add one and, for some service lines, a critical thinking block. One application per six months, and a rejection means a six month wait.
- How to practise
- EY-Style Assessment runs the scenarios, the sliders and the chart questions in one sitting, with the scenarios set at a professional services firm and the key argued from EY's eight skills. Situational Strengths for more scenarios on their own, Numerical Reasoning for the charts, Figure Series for the pattern items the FAQ lists, and Firm Prep for the written and video answers, which no drill here scores.