GCSE Chemistry Required Practicals Explained

June 2026

A significant chunk of GCSE Chemistry marks come from the required practicals. Examiners don't just ask what the result was — they ask why you used a particular method, what the variables were, and how you would improve the experiment. This guide explains what each practical tests and how to revise it.

Why required practicals are worth the effort

Around 15% of your marks assess practical skills, and these questions appear across every paper. The good news is that the underlying skills — measuring accurately, controlling variables, spotting sources of error — repeat across practicals, so revising them well pays off everywhere.

The key practicals to know

• Making a soluble salt from an insoluble base
• Titration to find the concentration of an acid or alkali
• Electrolysis of aqueous solutions
• Temperature change in reactions (energy changes)
• Investigating the rate of reaction (e.g. sodium thiosulfate and acid)
• Chromatography and identifying the Rf value
• Water purification and analysis

How to revise each practical

For every practical, learn the method as a sequence of steps, then make sure you can state the independent, dependent and control variables. Practise drawing and reading the apparatus, and learn one improvement and one source of error for each — these are the marks most students drop.

Turn the methods into recall practice

The fastest way to lock in practical methods is active recall: cover the steps and rewrite them from memory, then check. BrightRevision's flashcards with spaced repetition cover the required practicals so you can test yourself on apparatus, variables and key results without re-reading the textbook.