22 questions on percentage change, reverse percentages, simple and compound interest, and depreciation.
💷 Percentages and compound interest
Percentages appear on all three papers and in more contexts than any other single topic — prices, wages, interest, VAT, population, depreciation. This sheet covers the whole of it in order. It begins with percentage of an amount and percentage change, including finding the percentage rather than applying it; moves to multipliers, which make everything after this easier; then to reverse percentages, where you are given the value after the change and asked for the original, and where subtracting instead of dividing is the commonest error in the topic; then to simple interest, compound interest and depreciation, where the multiplier is raised to a power rather than multiplied by the number of years. The last few questions mix the types without labelling them, because on the paper they are not labelled either.
- 1.A quiz has 50 questions. Freya answers 10% of them incorrectly. Work out how many questions she answers incorrectly.
- 2.A jumper is reduced by 15% in a sale to a price of £42.50. Work out the original price.
- 3.Maya buys a vintage car for £15000. Its value is expected to increase by 4% each year for 2 years. She then plans to sell the car and use £2000 of the money from the sale to buy a trailer. Work out how much money she will have left after selling the car and buying the trailer.
- 4.Work out 8% of £250.
- 5.A charity shop buys a coat for £24 and sells it for a profit that is 3/8 of the buying price. Work out the selling price.
- 6.A cycle route is 350 m long. A footpath runs alongside it for 3/7 of that length. Work out the length of the footpath.
- 7.The price of a jacket increases by 50% and then decreases by 50%. Describe the overall change from the original price.
- 8.A company's turnover this year is £180,000. Last year's turnover was £120,000. Write down this year's turnover as a percentage of last year's turnover.
- 9.A machine is bought for £8500. Its value depreciates by 6% each year. Work out the value of the machine after 3 years, to the nearest pound.
- 10.A pair of trainers is priced at £80 online. The shop takes 25% off the price and then adds £10 for next-day delivery. Work out the total cost.
- 11.A laptop costs £800 when new. Its value decreases by 25% of its value at the start of each year. Work out how much value the laptop loses in the second year.
- 12.A car is bought for £9000. Its value decreases by 8% each year. Work out its value after 2 years.
- 13.Priya invests £750 in a savings account that pays simple interest. After 3 years, the account contains £840. Work out the annual rate of simple interest.
- 14.A washing machine costs £320 before VAT. VAT is charged at 20%. Work out the total price including VAT.
- 15.A jacket normally costs £65. In a sale it is reduced by 20%, and the shop then takes a further £5 off at the till. Work out the final price.
- 16.A car is bought for £12000. Its value falls by 15% in the first year and by 10% in each year after that. Work out the value of the car 3 years after it was bought.
- 17.Grace's mean mark in her maths tests rises from 70 to 84. Work out the percentage increase in her mean mark.
- 18.2/3 of an amount of money is £30. Work out the amount.
- 19.A pack contains 20 stickers. Noah gives 1/5 of the pack to his sister. Work out how many stickers he gives away.
- 20.A cinema has 250 seats. 12% of the seats are reserved. Work out how many of the seats are reserved.
- 21.A textbook is reduced from £60 to £45. Work out the percentage reduction.
- 22.A recipe uses 160 g of flour. Sam wants to increase the amount by 1/4. Work out the new amount of flour.
What is on this worksheet?
The sheet holds 22 questions drawn from the MathsUK bank — the content areas covered: Ratio, proportion and rates of change, Number (statements R9, R16, N12). It is pitched at GCSE Foundation and takes about 40 minutes to work through in full. It is built for independent practice, with full answers at the end for self-marking.
How to use the sheet well
- Print it or open it on screen — both work. Printing is A4; the screen view fits phones and tablets.
- Do all 22 questions before checking — about 40 minutes is the guide, but there is no time pressure.
- Check the answers — press “Show answers” or print the answer page separately.
- Redo the questions you got wrong — twice as effective as doing 22 fresh ones.
- “New questions” — builds a fresh sheet on the same statements, so you can practise again without repeats.
Why this sheet helps
MathsUK worksheets use questions graded by difficulty and a fair spread of correct-answer positions (the answer is not always (a)) — so the student really has to think about each question rather than guess a pattern. Every question is tagged to a DfE content statement and checked before it enters the bank. The answers come with a step-by-step explanation, not just a value — so a wrong answer becomes a lesson.
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