What Is a Good EQ Score? EQ-i 2.0, MSCEIT & Online Tests

You've taken an emotional intelligence (EQ) test and got a number — 104, or 78 out of 100, or "63rd percentile". Whether that is good depends almost entirely on which kind of test produced it, because the major EQ tests use different scales. Here is how to read each one.

The short answer

• EQ-i 2.0 and MSCEIT report standard scores where 100 is average and the standard deviation is 15. On that scale about half of people score between 90 and 110, about two-thirds between 85 and 115, and roughly 1 in 6 scores above 115. A score between 90 and 110 is ordinary, not weak.
• Percentiles tell you the share of a comparison group you scored above. The 50th percentile is the middle; the 84th percentile corresponds to a standard score of about 115.
• 0–100 scores on online tests are usually not percentiles. They often show how strongly you agreed with the items on a scale, and only mean "high" or "low" once they are compared with other people's answers.

First: which kind of EQ test did you take?

There are three families, and they measure different things:

Ability tests (MSCEIT). These work more like an IQ test: you solve emotion problems — reading faces, predicting how feelings change — and answers are scored against expert or consensus judgements. The model behind it has four branches: perceiving, using, understanding and managing emotions (Mayer, Salovey & Caruso, 2008).

Mixed-model self-report (EQ-i 2.0, Goleman-based scales). Questionnaires about your own traits and competencies — how you handle stress, how assertive or empathic you think you are. The EQ-i 2.0 is normed so that 100 is average. It also has a separate 360 version, where other people rate you.

Short online self-report tests (most free tests, including ours). Also questionnaires, usually shorter, and normed — if at all — against whoever happened to take that test online.

Ability and self-report measures agree with each other only weakly. In one study comparing them directly, the performance test predicted social functioning in ways the self-report did not, and self-reported EI overlapped heavily with personality traits (Brackett et al., 2006). So a high score on one does not imply a high score on the other.

What a percentile means

A percentile only means something relative to its comparison group. "70th percentile" on a test normed on a national sample is a different statement from "70th percentile among people who took this quiz online". Before reading a percentile as good or bad, find out who the comparison group was.

Also keep in mind that average is not bad. A score near the middle means your self-description looks like most people's. It is not a deficit.

What the subscales mean

Most EQ tests report several subscales. The names vary between tests, but they usually cover:

Self-awareness. How readily you notice and name your own emotions. Naming emotions is not just insight: in a brain-imaging study, putting feelings into words reduced amygdala activity compared with other tasks (Lieberman et al., 2007). A practical starting point is to name specific emotions ("irritated", "anxious") rather than "bad" or "stressed".

Self-regulation. How you manage emotional reactions, especially under pressure. Techniques with research support include cognitive reappraisal — reinterpreting a situation before reacting — and structured recovery time.

Motivation. In Goleman-based models, the drive to pursue goals for their own sake and to keep going after setbacks.

Empathy. How well you pick up on and understand other people's feelings. Active listening and deliberately checking your read of someone ("it sounds like you're frustrated — is that right?") are the usual practice routes.

Social skills / relationship management. How you use emotional information to handle conflict, influence and cooperation.

Is a "good" score different for different purposes?

For personal growth: the pattern matters more than the total. Which subscales are highest and lowest, and does that match what you notice in your own life?

At work: emotional intelligence shows modest, measure-dependent links to job performance. A meta-analysis found ability-based EI predicted performance only weakly, while self-report "mixed" EI measures predicted more strongly, partly because their content overlaps with personality (Joseph & Newman, 2010). That is a reason to use an EQ score for development, not selection. Using it to screen job candidates is poorly supported.

In therapy or coaching: a self-report score is a starting point for a conversation, not a diagnosis.

The self-report problem

A self-report EQ score is your own view of your emotional skills, and people are not always accurate judges of themselves. The way to check it is to compare your self-ratings with how people who know you well see you — which is what 360-degree versions of tests like the EQ-i 2.0 do. The gap between the two views is often more informative than either score.

Can you improve your EQ?

There is reasonable evidence that you can. A meta-analysis of 58 studies found that emotional intelligence training produces a moderate improvement on average, with smaller gains on ability measures than on self-report measures (Mattingly & Kraiger, 2019). Training that lasts weeks rather than an afternoon, and that involves practice and feedback rather than just explanation, is the kind to look for.

What My Path's EQ test measures

My Path's EQ test is a 41-item self-report questionnaire (about 15–20 minutes). It scores five scales — Self-Awareness, Self-Regulation, Motivation, Empathy and Social Skills — from 0 to 100, with a band that compares you with other people who took this form on My Path. That comparison group is self-selected online test-takers, not a national norm sample, and the result page says so. It is not an ability test and not the EQ-i 2.0.

Taking it needs a free account (a free account covers your first three tests), and your results are free to read. An optional AI-written report is a paid feature that uses AI tokens.

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