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 jumper is reduced by 15% in a sale to a price of £42.50. Work out the original price.
- 2.Grace's mean mark in her maths tests rises from 70 to 84. Work out the percentage increase in her mean mark.
- 3.A population of penguins on an island is 2400. The population is predicted to grow by 7% each year. Work out the predicted population after 2 years, to the nearest whole number.
- 4.A car is bought for £9000. Its value decreases by 8% each year. Work out its value after 2 years.
- 5.Work out 2/5 of 45.
- 6.£3000 is invested in a savings account that pays 4% compound interest each year. Work out the value of the investment after 2 years.
- 7.A concert hall has 300 seats. 20% of the seats are in the balcony. Work out how many of the seats are in the balcony.
- 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 car is bought for £17,500. Its value decreases by 12% in the first year, and by a further 10% of its reduced value in the second year. Work out the value of the car at the end of the second year, giving your answer to the nearest pound.
- 10.Write 3/4 as a percentage.
- 11.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.
- 12.Before a charity campaign, donations were £6400 per month. Donations grew by 8% in the first year after the campaign, and then fell by 3% in the second year as interest faded. Work out the amount donated per month at the end of the second year, to the nearest pound.
- 13.A quiz has 50 questions. Freya answers 10% of them incorrectly. Work out how many questions she answers incorrectly.
- 14.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.
- 15.Jamal invests £600 in a savings account paying 3% simple interest per year. Work out the total amount in the account after 4 years.
- 16.Work out 35% of 180.
- 17.The number of members of a running club increases from 45 to 54. Work out the percentage increase.
- 18.After a price increase of 10%, a laptop costs £330. Work out the original price.
- 19.40% of a number is 12 more than 25% of the same number. Work out the number.
- 20.Leah puts £4000 into a savings account paying 3% compound interest each year. At the end of 2 years she takes out all of the money and spends £1500 of it on a laptop. Work out how much of the money she has left.
- 21.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.
- 22.The same jumper is sold at two shops. Shop A charges £40 and Shop B charges £50. Write down the price at Shop A as a percentage of the price at Shop B.
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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