The McKinsey Solve Game in 2026: What It Tests and How to Prepare

20 hours ago
7 min read

Most people who Google "McKinsey Solve Game prep" land on the same answer from McKinsey itself: no specific preparation is needed.

We spent 6+ years each at McKinsey and watched the firm's recruiting funnel from both sides. So is the recommendation McKinsey gives true? The honest answer is: No.

It's true that you don't need a McKinsey-specific bootcamp or six months of drilling to pass. And that the game is not the main hurdle of securing a McKinsey job offer. Getting invited (so a perfect CV) and acing the case interviews are the big hurdles you have to jump.

But back to the game. It's false that the game is so well-designed that prep doesn't help. Roughly 80% of candidates fail the Solve Game. Most of them are smart, motivated people who didn't know what to expect. Two weeks of focused prep gets most of them through.

This post is the honest guide to the McKinsey Solve Game — also called the PSG, or Problem Solving Game — in its 2026 form. What's actually in it. What it actually tests. And how to prep for it without wasting time on the wrong drills.

What's In the Solve Game in 2026

The McKinsey Solve Game had always been a bit of a mixed bag. We were at the firm when it was introduced and saw the many variations. McKinsey rebuilt the assessment in 2024 and 2025, and the 2026 version is the most distinctive it's been. Depending on your region and the role you applied for, you'll get one of two formats:

The 65-minute version (two games): Redrock Study + Sea Wolf
The 85-minute version (three games): Redrock Study + Sea Wolf + the new Sustainable Futures Lab

You don't choose. McKinsey assigns the format based on where and what you applied for. If your invite email says 85 minutes, you're getting all three.

A walkthrough of each:

Redrock Study (35 minutes)

A four-phase case study delivered through the game interface. You're given a business problem — in 2026 it's framed around a wildlife conservation case, with declining animal populations and a budget to allocate — and you have to:

Read several data exhibits.
Do calculations using a built-in calculator.
Build a short structured recommendation in writing.

Redrock is the closest the assessment gets to a traditional case interview. If you've worked through cases, the analytical pattern will feel familiar. What's different is the time pressure, the on-screen exhibits, and the fact that you're typing your recommendation rather than speaking it. So mastering the basics of case interviews helps you ace this game.

Sea Wolf (30 minutes)

An optimisation game set across three ocean sites. At each site you have a pool of microbes with different attributes (resilience, growth rate, defence, that kind of thing) and a set of constraints (the site needs an average score above X, no microbe with attribute Y can be present, and so on). You pick three microbes per site that satisfy all the constraints simultaneously.

Sounds simple. It isn't. The combinations get hard fast, and the clock is unforgiving. Sea Wolf is the game where most candidates lose the most points — and the one most candidates underprep for.

Sustainable Futures Lab (20 minutes — only in the 85-minute version)

The newest game, added in 2025. A scenario-based module testing situational judgement: you're handed an evolving sustainability problem and have to make a series of decisions, each of which changes the next set of options.

There's no math here, and no clean "right" answer. It's about how you weigh trade-offs and adapt as the scenario shifts. Closer to a personal-fit interview than a case.

What McKinsey Actually Scores You On

McKinsey's official line is that the assessment measures "cognitive abilities" — critical thinking, decision-making, systems thinking, situational awareness. That's the marketing version.

The honest version is that McKinsey scores you on two distinct dimensions and they care about both:

1. The outcome — did you finish the game, and how well?

For Redrock and Sea Wolf there's a measurable result: did your calculations make sense? Did your microbe selections satisfy the constraints? For Sustainable Futures Lab the outcome is fuzzier but still tracked.

2. The process — how did you get to your answer?

This is the part candidates miss. McKinsey doesn't just look at whether your final answer is correct. It tracks how you got there — which exhibits you opened first, how much time you spent reading versus calculating, whether you backtracked, whether your clicks suggest a structured search or a panicked one.

The implication: a candidate who reaches the right answer through chaotic clicking will often score worse than one who reaches a slightly wrong answer through clean, logical steps. Two candidates with the same final score can be sorted into different buckets based on the process trail alone.

That's why "no prep needed" is misleading. The structured habits the game scores you on are absolutely buildable — and they don't show up by accident.

How to Prep in 2026 (Two Weeks, About 20 Hours)

You don't need a five-figure prep course or a 100-hour curriculum. You need roughly 20 focused hours over 2 weeks. Here's the plan we'd run today.

Week 1: Familiarity with the format (10 hours)

The single most important thing is to take the games — or a high-quality simulation of them — at least 4 times before your real attempt. Most candidates fail not because they can't solve the problems but because they're seeing the interface, the constraint logic, and the time pressure for the first time during the real assessment.

Free simulations are available from a handful of providers. Paid ones from specialists are also worth it if your budget allows. The point isn't which provider — it's that you've sat through the games four times before it counts.

Week 2: Sharpening the weak spots (10 hours)

After your first 4 simulations, you'll know exactly where you're losing points. The three most common gaps:

Math speed and accuracy on Redrock. Drill mental math. 15 minutes a day. A basic flashcard app does the job; so does a deck of paper cards. You should practice math anyway for the next step in the application process – the case interview.
Constraint logic on Sea Wolf. Practice the underlying skill — given items with multiple attributes, find the combination that satisfies all rules — by playing logic puzzles or doing Sea Wolf simulations specifically.
Decision-making on Sustainable Futures Lab. Read short business-school case studies aloud and force yourself to commit to a decision in 60 seconds. The skill the game tests is "make a defensible call under time pressure."

That's it. 20 hours, two weeks, no exotic course needed.

The 4 Mistakes That Sink Most Solve Candidates

We've watched the same four patterns show up in candidates who failed and were genuinely surprised by it.

1. Treating it like an IQ test

What the Solve Game actually tests is structured thinking under time pressure. Raw intelligence is roughly irrelevant — smart candidates who'd never sat through a timed interface assessment regularly fail, and less obviously brilliant candidates who'd done 4 simulations regularly pass. Treat it as a skill to build, not a talent to display.

2. Hearing "no prep needed" and then lightly familiarising with the content

McKinsey says no prep. Candidates hear "OK, light prep is fine." So they read one article and try one practice puzzle. That's worse than no prep — it gives false confidence without building familiarity. Either don't prep at all (and accept the 20% pass rate that comes with it), or prep properly. The middle ground is the worst place to be.

3. Burning all your time on Redrock

Redrock feels like the heart of the assessment because it's the longest game and the most case-like. Many candidates spend 80% of their prep time on it. But Sea Wolf is where most candidates lose the most points — because the constraint logic feels alien if you've never seen it before, and there's no obvious "right approach." Allocate your prep proportionally: Redrock 50%, Sea Wolf 35%, Sustainable Futures Lab 15%. And if you are already preparing for case interviews, you can even allocate a lower share to Redrock as it tests the same skills.

4. Skipping the post-game debrief

After each simulation, write a 5-line debrief. What did you click on first? Where did you backtrack? Where did the clock catch you? The debrief is where prep actually compounds. Without it, you'll repeat the same mistakes four times in a row.

What Happens After You Pass

Congratulations – once you are invited to the Solve Game you already passed the biggest hurdle in the application process – the CV screening. After you pass the Solve Game, you're invited to McKinsey case interviews. That's the prize. The PSG is a filter — a hard one — but it isn't the thing that gets you the offer. The case interview is.

If you're prepping for the Solve Game right now, the smartest move is to start case interview prep in parallel, not after. The two skills overlap less than you'd think (Redrock is the only game that vaguely resembles a case), but the case-interview cycle moves fast — most candidates who pass the PSG sit their first case interview within 2 to 3 weeks. If you start case prep only after the PSG result lands, you'll be cramming.

We built our Case Interview Mastery course on Udemy for exactly that: To help you prepare for the case interview in the most efficient way without wasting time. It covers the case interview basics (i.e., structuring, case math, interpreting exhibits, recommendation) and provides 7 McKinsey style cases that come as close to the real cases as it gets. Including detailed solutions with insider tips. All the content is prepared and taught by us, former McKinsey consultants and interviewers.

The Bottom Line

The McKinsey Solve Game in 2026 is two games for most candidates (Redrock + Sea Wolf, 65 minutes) or three for some (add Sustainable Futures Lab, 85 minutes). Roughly 1 in 5 candidates pass without preparation. With 20 focused hours over 2 weeks — four simulations plus targeted drills on your weak spots — you'll be in the top half of the cohort and secure yourself the invite to the case interview – the real hurdle in the application process.

McKinsey says no prep is needed. But please do yourself a favor an prepare for the game. You did not pass the CV screening to be later rejected for not preparing for the problem solving game. If you don’t prepare you leave the outcome to pure luck.

Ideally you already start before the PSG with the case interview preparation. Many skills are transferable and you don’t want to run out of prep time if you only start after passing the PSG. Because in the end, the case interview, not the PSG, is what actually gets you the offer.