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Free Anxiety Test: the Real GAD-7, Scored the Way a Clinician Would

The actual GAD-7 — the seven-item anxiety scale used in clinics worldwide — reproduced exactly, with the published cutoffs. Free, anonymous, instant result, nothing stored.

Brihas·Updated 12 October 2026

What this is, in four lines

This is the GAD-7 — a seven-item anxiety scale developed by Spitzer, Kroenke, Williams and Löwe and published in Archives of Internal Medicine in 2006. It is the instrument most doctors and therapists actually use.
It is reproduced here exactly: same seven items, same four answers, same scoring, same cutoffs. Nothing added, nothing reworded. We can do that because Pfizer placed it in the public domain in July 2010 — no permission or fee required.
A score of 10 or more is the instrument's own threshold for “worth a proper look by a professional”. At that point it catches about 89% of generalised anxiety cases while correctly clearing about 82% of people without it.
It is a screener, not a diagnosis. Seven questions cannot diagnose anyone. 7 items, ~2 minutes, no account, no email, nothing leaves your browser.

Most “free anxiety tests” online are not the GAD-7. They are item sets someone wrote, scored against thresholds someone chose, presented with the confidence of a clinical instrument. Some of them are the front door of a therapy practice, and the result is the lead. This page is the opposite arrangement: the real scale, the published numbers, no gate, and an explanation of its limits underneath — including the ones that are inconvenient for us.

Over the last 2 weeks, how often have you been bothered by the following problems?

Part 1 of 1

Feeling nervous, anxious or on edge

Not being able to stop or control worrying

Worrying too much about different things

Trouble relaxing

Being so restless that it is hard to sit still

Becoming easily annoyed or irritable

Feeling afraid as if something awful might happen

0 of 7 answered

No account, no email. Your answers stay in this browser and are never sent to us.

What your score means

The GAD-7 produces a single number from 0 to 21. Each of the seven items scores 0 for not at all up to 3 for nearly every day, and the seven are added. The bands below are the published ones — they are not our interpretation, and we have not moved them.

Score	Band	What the published guidance says
0–4	Minimal anxiety	Symptoms in the lowest range. If something still feels wrong, anxiety may be the wrong lens — see below.
5–9	Mild anxiety	Present and noticeable, below the referral threshold. The band most people who search for an anxiety test land in.
10–14	Moderate anxiety	At or above the screening threshold. Further assessment by a professional is recommended.
15–21	Severe anxiety	Well above the threshold. A strong case for talking to a doctor, therapist or psychiatrist.

What this score cannot tell you

Four real limits. None of these are on the competing pages, and all four change how you should read your number.

It cannot tell you which anxiety. The GAD-7 was built for generalised anxiety. Panic, social anxiety, health anxiety, OCD and post-traumatic stress all raise this score without being the thing it measures — and they are treated differently. A high score says “take this somewhere”, not “you have GAD”.
Every item points the same way. There are no reverse-scored items, so somebody inclined to agree with statements will score a little higher than their experience warrants. That is a known property of the published instrument, and we will not add a reversed item to patch it, because modifying the scale would invalidate the cutoffs above. Read a borderline score as borderline.
It only sees two weeks. That is the stem: over the last 2 weeks. A hard fortnight reads as anxiety, and a long-standing pattern that happens to be quiet right now reads as minimal. One GAD-7 is a snapshot. Two, a month apart, is information.
It cannot see cause. The score is intensity, not origin. Thyroid problems, anaemia, medication, caffeine, alcohol withdrawal, sleep apnoea and perimenopause all produce exactly these seven symptoms, which is one more reason a high score belongs in front of a doctor rather than in a self-help plan.

If you scored low and something is still wrong

This is the most common way an anxiety test fails someone. “Anxiety” is the nearest available word for several different states, and the GAD-7 scores two of them low. If the number came back smaller than your week felt, the honest reading is probably that the lens is wrong rather than that you are fine.

What it actually feels like	More likely	Where to look
Running on empty. Cynical about work. Nothing left at the end of the day.	Burnout — exhaustion, not dread	Burnout test
Replaying conversations. Twenty passes over the same event, no new information.	Rumination — past-directed	Overthinking test
Cannot close one specific decision. Researching past usefulness.	Analysis paralysis	Overthinking test
Head full of unfinished things, nothing dangerous, no room to think.	Open loops, not anxiety	Mind sweep

What to actually do with the number

After you have a score

Write the number and the date downBoth. A GAD-7 of 12 means very little on its own and a great deal next to a 7 from last month. This is the single highest-value thing you can do with the result, and it takes ten seconds.
Find your highest-scoring itemNot the total — the item. “Trouble relaxing” at 3 and “feeling afraid something awful might happen” at 0 is a different situation from the reverse, and the first is far more tractable without help.
Ask what the last two weeks containedThe score measures how much; only you know of what. A deadline, a diagnosis in the family, a decision you have been carrying. Anxiety that has an object is a different problem from anxiety that does not.
If you scored 10 or more, take it to a professionalSay the number and the date. The GAD-7 is the instrument they already use, so it arrives as useful information rather than as something off the internet — and it saves the first ten minutes of the appointment.
Retake it in two to four weeks, not tomorrowThe stem asks about a two-week window, so retaking it inside that window measures the same fortnight twice. Four weeks apart gives you a direction, which is the part that is actually actionable.

A number tells you where you are. What it cannot do is work out which part of your life is producing it — that takes thinking something through with a bit of structure, which is what Brihas is for.

Talk it through with Brihas →

Anxiety and the GAD-7: common questions

Is this the real GAD-7?

Yes — the same seven items, response options, scoring and severity cutoffs as the published instrument, unmodified. The GAD-7 was developed by Spitzer, Kroenke, Williams and Löwe (Archives of Internal Medicine, 2006) and placed in the public domain by Pfizer in July 2010, so no permission or fee is required to reproduce it. We have deliberately not added items or subscales, because doing so would mean the published cutoffs no longer applied to the score you are shown.

Is the anxiety test free, and do I need an account?

It is free, and there is no account, no email and no paywall. The questions are scored in your browser and your answers are never sent anywhere — we do not receive them, so we could not store them if we wanted to. We do count anonymously that a test was started and completed, and which band resulted, because otherwise we cannot tell a page people use from one nobody does.

What is a normal GAD-7 score?

0–4 is the minimal range and is where most people without anxiety symptoms sit. 5–9 is mild. The honest answer, though, is that “normal” is the wrong frame for a seven-item screener: it is designed to flag who should be looked at more closely, not to rank you against a population.

Does a high score mean I have an anxiety disorder?

No. A score of 10 or more means further assessment is warranted — at that cut-point the GAD-7 identifies about 89% of people who do have generalised anxiety disorder, while correctly clearing about 82% of people who do not. Both numbers are short of 100, so the score cannot diagnose you in either direction. Only a qualified professional can do that, and several physical conditions produce the same seven symptoms.

What is the difference between anxiety and burnout?

Anxiety is dread, mostly forward-looking — the sense that something bad is coming. Burnout is depletion: exhaustion, cynicism about work that used to matter, and the feeling of being less effective than you were. They overlap and often co-occur, but the GAD-7 scores burnout fairly low, which is why someone who is burnt out can take an anxiety test and come away thinking nothing is wrong. If the dominant feeling is empty rather than afraid, take the burnout test instead.

Can I use this GAD-7 result with my doctor or therapist?

Yes, and it is genuinely useful. Because this is the unmodified instrument, the number means the same thing to them as it would if they had administered it. Bring the score and the date. It is not a diagnosis and will not be treated as one, but it is a precise starting point rather than a description.

How often should I retake it?

Every two to four weeks at most. The GAD-7 asks about the previous two weeks, so taking it again the next day re-measures the same fortnight. The useful signal is the direction across a few readings, not any single number.

Is the GAD-7 valid for teenagers?

It was developed and validated in adults, and it has been studied in adolescents since, but this page is written for adults and should not be used to draw conclusions about a child. For someone under 18, the right move is a GP or a school counsellor rather than any online screener.

About this test

This is the GAD-7 (Generalised Anxiety Disorder 7-item scale), reproduced exactly as published — the same seven items, the same four response options, the same scoring and the same severity cutoffs a clinician would use. It was developed by Robert Spitzer, Kurt Kroenke, Janet Williams and Bernd Löwe, and published in Archives of Internal Medicine in 2006. Pfizer placed it in the public domain in July 2010: no permission or fee is required to reproduce, translate, display or distribute it. We have not modified it, added items to it, or renamed it, because any of those would mean the published cutoffs no longer applied to the number you are shown. The GAD-7 is a screening instrument. It is not a diagnosis, it cannot distinguish generalised anxiety from panic, social or health anxiety, and only a qualified professional can tell you what your score means for you.

Sources

Keep going

GuideAnxiety, in plain termsWhat the word covers, what it does not, and which of the three common mix-ups you are probably dealing with.Free toolBurnout testIf the feeling is empty rather than afraid, this is the scale that will actually register it.Free toolOverthinking testSeparates rumination, worry and analysis paralysis — because the three need different responses.

Brihas is a structured reflection tool, not a medical or diagnostic service. Nothing here is a diagnosis, a treatment plan, or a substitute for care from a qualified professional. If you are in crisis, please reach a helpline or a clinician.