🧠 N5 · Calculator-Free Strategies

Dedicated preparation for Part 5 of the LANTITE — the 13 non-calculator questions you must complete in approximately 20 minutes, after which you cannot return to the calculator section. While this is only 20% of the questions, the time pressure and the inability to fall back on technology make it the section many candidates fear most.

This course teaches you the mental methods, benchmark conversions, and pen-and-paper techniques that make calculator-free work fast and reliable. You’ll learn the 10% method for percentages, fraction-to-decimal benchmarks worth memorising, estimation strategies, rounding rules, and how to spot when a question has been deliberately written to be calculator-free-friendly.

The skills here also benefit your work in the calculator section — they help you sense-check answers, catch input errors, and avoid wasted calculator taps on questions that don’t need them. We recommend treating this course as a second pass after you’ve completed N2, N3, and N4.