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Numerical Tolerance for Assignments

Numerical tolerance determines how close your students' answers must be to the answer key to be counted as correct. Overriding numerical tolerance is not recommended.

Note This information describes how to use the new Assignment Editor.

If needed, click Try the New Assignment Editor in the original Assignment Editor to enable this improved experience now.

Important
  • In most cases, the default tolerances used in WebAssign (±2% or ±1 at the last significant digit) or specified in the code for a textbook question result in accurate scoring and should not be changed.
  • If you change the tolerance, your students' answers might not be scored accurately.
  • Do not set the tolerance to 0; this often results in some correct answers being marked incorrect. Instead, use a very small tolerance such as ±0.01%.
  • If a question is not grading correctly, do not override the tolerance to accept a wider range of student answers. Instead, report the question error so that it can be fixed.

Precedence of tolerance settings

Numerical tolerance can be set in the following places in WebAssign and are applied in the following precedence order.

Tolerance setting Description
Per-question assignment setting
  • Overrides all other tolerances
  • Applies to every part of the question
Assignment setting
  • Overrides tolerance settings listed below
Class setting
  • Overrides tolerance settings listed below
Question code
  • Overrides default tolerance
  • If needed, textbook questions set tolerances for the question or specific question parts—for example, math questions requiring simple integer computation or fractions set a tolerance of 0
  • If needed for symbolic mode questions, tolerance must be set in the question code
Default If no other tolerance is set, WebAssign uses a default tolerance of ±2%.

Override tolerance for assignment question

Important Not recommended.

These settings are not available for all questions.

  1. In the Assignment Editor, expand the Questions section, then expand the question.
  2. Click Points adjustment.
  3. Select Override numerical tolerance.
  4. Set Answers are correct if within ± to a percentage from 0 to 100.
  5. Click Save at the top of the assignment.

Override tolerance for assignment

Important Not recommended.

These settings apply only to questions where number tolerance can be adjusted. Some question types are not affected by number tolerance settings.

  1. In the Assignment Editor, expand Settings > Scoring > Advanced Settings.
  2. Select Override numerical tolerance.
  3. Set Answers are correct if within ± to a percentage from 0 to 100.
  4. Save customized settings as a template to reuse on other assignments.
    1. Under Settings, click Save as New Template.
      This is only shown if you have changed settings from the default.
    2. Enter your template name.
    3. Click Save Template.
  5. Click Save at the top of the assignment.

Override tolerance for class section

Important Not recommended.

These settings apply only to questions where number tolerance can be adjusted. Some question types are not affected by number tolerance settings.

  1. Open the Class Settings page.

    From My Classes, click Edit Class Settings.

  2. In the Class Settings page, click Advanced Options.
  3. For Tolerance under Numerical Options, type a non-negative number and select either % or units.
  4. Click Save.