Seven questions about the past two weeks, starting with how often you have been feeling nervous, anxious, or on edge. The calculator adds your score and shows what band it falls in. About two minutes, free and anonymous.
Short version: seven questions, a score out of 21, and a cutoff at 10. It is the anxiety screening tool healthcare professionals reach for first, in primary care and in psychiatry alike.
The GAD-7 (Generalized Anxiety Disorder 7-item scale) is the most widely used anxiety screening test in primary care and psychiatry. Seven questions, about two minutes, each rated 0–3 for how often the symptom bothered you over the past two weeks. It was developed by Spitzer, Kroenke, and colleagues and is in the public domain.
It was built to detect generalized anxiety disorder, but it also performs reasonably well as a general anxiety symptoms test, elevated scores are common in panic disorder, social anxiety, and PTSD too. What it measures is the intensity of anxiety symptoms, not which specific anxiety disorder you have.
Total score ranges from 0 to 21. The standard interpretation bands:
A score of 10 or above is the threshold most clinicians treat as meaningful. For tracking treatment response, a 4-point reduction is generally considered clinically significant.
What it can't tell you: whether your anxiety is primary or secondary to something else. An elevated GAD-7 can reflect untreated ADHD, a thyroid problem, sleep apnea, a medication side effect, stimulant or caffeine intake, or the early phase of a mood disorder. It also doesn't distinguish generalized anxiety from panic disorder or social anxiety, which respond to somewhat different approaches. That's what an evaluation is for.
The results screen includes a print option, printing to PDF gives you a copy to bring to a first appointment or to compare against a later score. Nothing you enter is transmitted to us or stored on a server; the test runs entirely in your browser.
Anxiety and ADHD overlap substantially and are frequently confused, if the GAD-7 came back elevated and you also struggle with focus, telling ADHD and anxiety apart is worth reading.
Scores run 0–21. A score of 10 or above is the standard cutoff for probable generalized anxiety disorder; 15 and above indicates severe anxiety. Below 5 is considered minimal.
The GAD-7 is extensively validated and is the anxiety screener most clinicians use. But it's a screening tool, not a diagnostic one, it measures symptom intensity and can't tell you the cause. A high score means a clinical conversation is worthwhile.
No. A diagnosis requires duration criteria, functional impairment, and ruling out medical causes, substances, and other psychiatric conditions that produce anxiety symptoms. The GAD-7 is a starting point for that evaluation.
Not specifically. It was designed for generalized anxiety, though people with panic disorder or social anxiety often score high on it too. If your anxiety is mainly panic episodes or social situations, mention that at your visit, treatment differs somewhat.
Yes. Free, no account, and it runs entirely in your browser, your answers are never sent to us or stored anywhere. The GAD-7 itself is in the public domain.