Career Tests: Must-Have Tool to Find Your Ideal New Career Over 50

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Starting a new career at 50 is no small undertaking. If it’s time for a new career but you have no idea which career path you want to pursue, I highly recommend taking one (or multiple) career tests to help you learn to apply your preferences and talents to a new occupational field.

Are you pondering starting a new career? Believe it or not, many people change careers multiple times through their life. These days, changing your career at midlife, say 40 or even 50+, is very possible to do.

Whether you’re burnt out on your current career or looking for more long term job satisfaction, you can find a new rewarding career at 50 that meets your financial, personal, and professional desires.

While it’s possible to start a new career over 50, you may find yourself wondering “what career is right for me?” If you don’t know where to start, that feeling can be overwhelming. However, the good news is that there are many resources out there to help you narrow down the fields and options so that you can find your next career and start a new chapter.

Some of my favorite resources to use when pondering a career change are career tests. These are fairly short quizzes that factor in your interests, skills, values, and goals to help you discover which career field would suit your skillset and your personality the best.

Now, I’m not saying that career tests will guarantee that your dream job will be your career for the rest of your working life. However, they will give you invaluable insight into the type of environment you thrive in as well as your working style.

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Which Career Tests Are the Best?

If you were to just do a random Google search for career tests, you would find lots of options, some free career tests and some paid. So how do you know which ones are worth your time and which ones aren’t?

I’ve done the research for you and compiled the top career personality and assessment tests that you can take to help you drastically narrow down your field of choices and help you quickly find out the ideal field for your next career.

Best Career Tests To Help Change Careers at 50

Ready to jump in and finally learn what job(s) is the best fit for you? Check out this list of top career path quizzes. While this may seem obvious, I feel it’s important to say: answer them as honestly as possible to help you find a job you’ll truly enjoy.

Note: Most of these options are free career tests, but a few have paid options. I’ve included in each description what you can expect in terms of fees.

My Next Move: O*Net Interest Profiler

The O*NET Interest Profiler is sponsored by the U.S. Department of Labor. It’s a free job quiz that will ask you 60 work-related questions (on an agree/disagree sliding scale) to help you identify what your career interests are. Once it identifies your career interest, it will suggest potential job fields.

An excellent quiz for anyone wanting to change careers at 50 (or over), one of the best things about this career test is that it allows you to explore opportunities based on your education level and experience. You are also able to filter out suggestions based on how much preparation is necessary (to help you find jobs for which you’re already qualified).

Cost: $0

123Test.com: Career Aptitude Test

This free career aptitude test asks questions a little differently. Every question shows four photos, each depicting people doing work-related tasks. You indicate your most favorite and least favorite activities by choosing “yes” or “no” for each image based on whether you could see yourself enjoying the task.

After you complete 15 questions (about 5-10 minutes), you get your results as a “Holland Code” which is based on John Holland’s theory of careers and personality types. These results will give you a list of work environments and occupations best suit your career personality.

Cost: $0

Princeton Review Career Quiz

It only makes sense that the big player in student test preparation would also have a career quiz. The format is similar in that it offers examples of people doing things and asks your preference when comparing two tasks. One example might be “I would rather be an auditor” vs “I would rather be a musician”.

It’s 24 questions long, at the end of which, you receive a color that indicates your perceived style and interests. Princeton Review offers potential career ideas based on people with the same color result.

Although the results may not be as detailed, they do offer some useful career path indicators that you might find useful.

Cost: $0

Gallup: CliftonStrengths

The CliftonStrengths Assessment helps quiz takers discover their natural talents, coaches on how to turn those talents into strengths, and then advises on how to deliberately use those talents to advance their career.

Once you finish the quiz, you’ll receive a custom report listing your most powerful natural talents as well as other resource materials to help you achieve personal success.

Cost: starts at $19.99

Career Test

Career Test is a job assessment test that takes into account several factors including:

What’s fun to you
What you prefer to avoid
Your values
Stress tolerance
Your educational plans
Career style

The quiz takes about 10-15 minutes and takes into account not only your interests but also the skills and education you currently possess as well as any that you would like to develop.

Cost: $6.99 for students or $9.99 for adults to receive your full results

What Career Is Right For Me: Career Aptitude Test

This test approaches several areas that impact a good career fit and asks you to rank your skill set on a sliding scale from low to high. This test covers skills, interests, work style, personal values, and finally, desired income as well as educational requirements and potential job market growth in your field.

The results give you careers in different fields along with links for job listings as well as nearby schools.

Cost: $0

Truity: The Big Five Personality Test

This 10-minute career test sheds light on careers as well as specific tasks that are a good fit, how you work in a team, handle stressful situations, and solve challenging problems. The results guide you through how to maximize your strengths and understand your natural talents in order to choose a career that will keep you interested and content. The information you receive from this quiz is especially useful concerning how you work with coworkers.

Cost: $0 for the basic report. The full report is $19.95

MyPlan.com: Various Tests

MyPlan.com offers four different career testing options:

personality test
interest inventory
skills profiler
values assessment

You can take them individually, but you get the biggest benefit from taking all four. Similar to the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator test, these quizzes will objectively measure your career personality to help you find your ideal occupation.

Your results will put you into one of 6 work values clusters. Once you are put into a cluster, you’ll be given a list of careers that match your values.

Cost: $0 – $19.95

CareerExplorer: Career Test

This comprehensive career test, similar to 123 Career Test, uses Holland codes to measure your interests and gather 140 different traits about your unique personality.

This career assessment tool validates their results in two different ways: their suggested interest predictions are cross-referenced against the test taker’s inclination to like a career on the test. In addition, the overall predictions are validated by the test taker’s review of their career history.

This 20-minute test gathers in depth predictive career information that yields a personalized report of top career matches and insights.

Cost: $0 for the basic report; the premium report is $35

Your Free Career Test

If you really want something quick and easy so you avoid testing fatigue, Your Free Career Test is just the tool you want. It only takes 5 minutes, and the results are easy to share with friends, family, or potential employers.

Cost: $0

The Myers-Briggs Organization: MBTI Instrument

Because you can apply what you learn from the MBTI across every segment of your life, it’s a favorite assessment used by employers and career coaches. This career test is considered to be the top notch option since it gives you loads of data regarding your personality preferences, such as how you make decisions, how you process information, and much more.

The official test can be a little expensive, so if you prefer, you can take a pretty good (free) online version.

Cost: $49.95 for a basic report; $175 if you want a report with personal feedback

PathSource

Do you prefer to accomplish tasks on the go? If so, you’ll want to consider using PathSource, a free career assessment app. In addition to results from a career quiz, you can take advantage of many other resources such as interviews with people in different professions.

Career Tests: Final Thoughts

When you want to start a new career at 50 and have no idea where to start, taking a career test is one of the most beneficial things you can do. This simple act will help steer you toward a new career that’s both motivating and rewarding.

If this list or career tests seems overwhelming at first, don’t worry. There are many options here, but start by narrowing down all the options by their cost and then again by the type of information you are hoping to gleam from the results. It’s really ok to take multiple (or all!) of these tests, because you’ll likely find out something new about yourself with each one.

I have a feeling that you’ll approach this test taking exercise in a way that fits your personality – let’s call it another tool to help you learn more about yourself! 😉