Business Studies IGCSE- The ultimate guide
A carefully curated collection of the best resources available for free online for the Business Studies Cambridge IGCSE exam.
Validity of this article:
This guide is specifically designed for the 2023-2025 set of Business Studies (0450) exams. That being said even if you are viewing this sometime in the future, it can still be quite useful as Cambridge tends not to change the exam format, structure and content too often.
Overview:
To prepare for the business exam you must have 2 main skills: content and the ability to write the exam.
Yes I know this is obvious, but you would be surprised at how many candidates struggle with the latter - even if they have the appropriate content knowledge. In the rest of this article I will teach you: how to learn content, how to write the exam and why you should not stress out. If you are too lazy to read this scroll to the bottom for a short summary.
Learning content
My single biggest (and perhaps most controversial) tip is do not read the textbook cover to cover. The textbook you are using is likely going to be too large and verbose to get through for revision. Trying to read the entire thing before the exam is going to be stressful and time consuming- and not even worth it!
So what do you do instead?
Use these free resources:
Znotes Theory - This is a concise summary of everything (yes everything) that can show up in your exams. You can go through the entire thing in a couple of hours and greatly improve your knowledge
Znotes Definitions - These are all the definitions you will have to remember for your exams. Definitions are important because although they only make up 5% of your total exam score, they are the first thing the examiner sees when s/he corrects any question you write so your ability to define a concept well can make a great first impression (which is important in a subjective subject like business). Additionally, reviewing all the key terms also acts as an effective form of memorization
Reading and all is great. But true learning comes when you test yourself. This a deck of flashcards I made which contains all the definitions you will have to know. Bear in mind there a few typos here and there so if you want you can quickly make a Remnote account and save the document so you can customize it however you like!
The flashcards should look something like this :)
If you don’t like reading, this playlist also contains all the information you will need to know to get an A*. I recommend watching the videos on double speed to cram before your exam
The process I used for learning content
Read the definitions for chapter 1 on Znotes
Read the theory notes for chapter 1 on Znotes
Do the flashcards for chapter 1 on Remnote
Repeat the same process with all the chapters
When I have doubts about concepts I can refer to the textbook
Do past papers as mark schemes also contain lots of knowledge
How to write the exam?
This is the real meat of the Business studies experience. Many students know their concepts well but still don’t get the top mark because of their inability to write the exam. I wont go over exactly what you need to do for each sort of question because that will take too much time, but I will point you towards all the best resources to learn.
Free resources
Example candidate response for paper 2
These are examiner reports. They are literally a golden treasure trove of knowledge. Read both of these and you will 10x your ability to score marks. This resource is made by Cambridge themselves, and they analyze several example answers and teach you how to score well.
Ed's Business Essentials Youtube videos
This guy is a legend. It is worth taking a day or so to just scroll through all the videos he posted about IGCSE Business. His knowledge and tips are invaluable, look out for his Survival guides and his evaluation videos they are the best.
What else should I do?
Other then reading the free resources do past papers. I would recommend starting from 2021 and working your way upwards through the years (each year has 7 sets of papers so you have plenty of revision).
Its important though to not just do past papers but also check your answers yourselves with the mark schemes given. But what is even lesser known but extremely useful is, once you are done self evaluating your work to read the examiner report for the exam you have just given (they are labeled with the suffix er on most past paper repositories and look like this).
But Arjun how do I correct my own work?
If you read the mark schemes closely and also read the examiner reports you will be able to roughly understand how many marks your answer deserves. But if you are unsure of your exact grade- the rule of thumb is to always underestimate and score yourself harshly so that in the real exam you do better.
I’m still stressed what should I do?
Okay lmao I can understand your situation. This is a large two year course and you have most probably procrastinated till 2 weeks before your exam. Don’t worry.
First of all you may be overwhelmed by the amount of advantages and disadvantages you need to memorize. However you are usually only required to know 2 advantages and disadvantages for each topic, because most questions only require this much knowledge. That being said, there are rare cases in which questions ask for 4 advantages or disadvantages on a certain topic but this is quite rare and also you don’t really have to write down all 4 advantages to secure an A*.
Know your margin of error. You absolutely do not have to be perfect, you can miss entire questions and still get an A*. Take a look at this.
These are statistics coming straight from Cambridge. If you get above a 34/80 paper 1 or 2 that is considered an A. You can get most of your questions wrong and still get an A.
To get an A* people only needed to get a score of 90/160 . This information is taken from the 2022 June series, but the low grade thresholds in business are pretty much a constant.
Now that’s not to say you should carelessly write your answers because an A* is very easy, take care and try to get the highest possible mark but also relax knowing that even if you do badly- you may end up with a good grade!
TLDR (summary)
Use this to learn content:
Use this to learn how to write:
Make sure to practise past papers- correct your answers yourselves and then look at the examiner report.
Don’t stress out. You will at max only need to score 50/80 in both your papers to get an A*. You don’t need to memorize lots of advantages and disadvantages- if you are short on time 2 each should suffice.
Feel free to reach out to me at karjun2901@gmail.com and ask me about any questions you may have!
Thank you so much for this detailed explanation, as before, studying business had always been a rigmarole but now I can achieve the highest band possible!
Your study guide is a masterpiece of meticulous research and thoughtful analysis. Its insightful strategies and comprehensive approach will undoubtedly prove invaluable to us students striving for excellence in the field of business. Thank you.