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 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.
- 2.A company had 8000 employees. The number of employees decreased by 5% in the first year, and then increased by 5% in the second year. Work out the number of employees at the end of the second year, to the nearest whole number.
- 3.A textbook is reduced from £60 to £45. Work out the percentage reduction.
- 4.A recipe uses 160 g of flour. Sam wants to increase the amount by 1/4. Work out the new amount of flour.
- 5.£2000 is invested in a savings account that pays 5% compound interest each year. Work out the value of the investment at the end of 2 years.
- 6.A car is bought for £9000. Its value decreases by 8% each year. Work out its value after 2 years.
- 7.A charity raffle sells 240 tickets at £1.85 each. 40% of the money raised is given to a local hospital. Work out how much money the hospital receives.
- 8.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.
- 9.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.
- 10.A company's profit this year is 130% of last year's profit. Last year's profit was £40,000. Work out this year's profit.
- 11.Jamal invests £600 in a savings account paying 3% simple interest per year. Work out the total amount in the account after 4 years.
- 12.In a test, Amelia answered 18 of the 24 questions correctly. Work out the percentage of the questions she answered correctly.
- 13.A restaurant adds a service charge of 15% to a bill of £120. Work out the service charge.
- 14.Work out 15% of £40, using 10% and 5%.
- 15.Write 0.25 as a percentage.
- 16.A box holds 80 chocolates. 75% of them are milk chocolates. Work out how many milk chocolates are in the box.
- 17.Grace's mean mark in her maths tests rises from 70 to 84. Work out the percentage increase in her mean mark.
- 18.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.
- 19.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.
- 20.Work out the difference between 45% of 70 and 35% of 80.
- 21.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.
- 22.A savings account pays 3.5% compound interest each year. Bilal invests £1200. Work out how much interest, in total, he earns after 2 years, to the nearest penny.
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.
Similar worksheets worth a look
- ✏️ Paper 1 non-calculator warm-up — Foundation · 20 questions · ~25 min
- 🎯 Grade 4 pass booster · 25 questions · ~40 min
- ⚖️ Foundation to Higher crossover check · 20 questions · ~35 min
- ⚗️ Ratio and proportion mastery — Higher · 24 questions · ~45 min