ACT Online vs. Remote Exam

We’ve noticed a strange artifact on ACT’s website that we alerted our readers to a few months ago: the use of the terms “remote” and “online” to refer to two different types of test administrations. Because they continue to use this language and pepper in information and updates in various pages (e.g. their Registration page, FAQ page, and Blog page), we thought it would be useful to spell out their definitions clearly here, so if you ever spot an update before we do, you can return to this to help decipher what it means. 

Remote = at-home test administration, connected via the internet. 

Online = at-test-center test administration, on a computer. 

Regular = at-test-center test administration, using a paper booklet. 

Below you can see them delineate the terms on various places on their website. Note that both of the next two screenshots describing Online and Remote are taken from the following page: https://www.act.org/content/act/en/products-and-services/the-act/help.html

Another example using the term Online, which has a different timeline for the Remote option, from https://www.act.org/content/act/en/covid-19.html

Confusing? Absolutely. But once they laid out their terms, they had to stick by them to stay consistent. As always, thanks for reading and alerting us when you find out new information so we can pass it on to our greater community.