The 7 Most Popular Personality Tests To Explore

You must have felt lost at some point in your life. Really knowing who you are and what you want in life can be a long journey. Whether you are fully in touch with yourself or not, it’s always better to take popular personality tests to get your potential.  

What Are Personality Tests and Why Are They Important?

Personality tests are designed to help each individual recognize their potential, characteristics and behaviors.  For example, one can take the DISC test to better know himself in the workplace setting. On the other hand, MBTI is more suited for understanding root motivations. 

Personality tests are crucial to navigate through life and career. Though they cannot determine the entire path of someone, they provide people with self-knowledge to make informed decisions. 

For beginners seeking simple and free personality tests, discpersonalities.com offers accessible tools that make self-discovery easy and reliable.

How Do Personality Tests Work?

Popular personality tests often include questions or scenarios to ask test-takers. The questionnaire is often based on psychological theories. For instance, the Big Five test is intended to categorize human behaviors into 5 traits: Openness, Conscientiousness, Extraversion, Agreeableness, Neuroticism. 

Other popular personality tests come from distinct psychological theories as follows:

7 Most Popular Personality Tests

Here are top 7 most trusted and popular personality tests that can help you better know yourself!

1. DISC Assessment

One of the most popular personality tests nowadays. DISC offers people the key to understanding themselves at the workplace. DISC assesses an individual's patterns, communication and preferences at work. 

Each letter in DISC represents different traits:

• Dominant (D): Describes someone that loves to take control of things. A definite go-getter, dominant people strive for excellence and focus on results. Leadership roles are usually fitted for people with a loud dominant trait.
• Influence (I): Describes someone that loves to connect and make impacts. Influential people are sociable, the life and soul of the party and positive.
• Steady (S): Describes someone that values security and stability. Steady people make sure that someone is comfortable and secure at work. They are also good listeners who care about colleagues’ problems.
• Compliance (C): Describes someone that focuses on precision and accuracy. Compliant people read between the lines, seeing major to minor imperfections at work. Plus, they always try to produce better results.

Discover the most suitable career path for each types among 16 disc personality types

>>> DISC type D careers

>>> DISC I type careers

>>> DISC type S careers

>>> DISC type C careers

2. Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI)

The MBTI test is so popular that almost anyone must have done it one time in their life. In an MBTI test, there are often 4 dichotomies as follows

• Extraversion/Introversion
• Sensing/Intuition
• Thinking/Feeling
• Judging/Perceiving

A person can fall anywhere between 4 spectrums presented in his MBTI result. Unlike DISC (frequently used for workplace settings), MBTI delves deeper into a person’s psychological preferences and innate ways of seeing the world. 

From the 4 basic categories, MBTI further divides the combination of each category into 16 personality types: 

Read more: What’s the difference between DISC and MBTI?

3. Big Five Personality Test

Big Five Personality tests each person based on 5 broad dimensions. It is one of the most scientifically validated frameworks for describing personality. What’s more, its descriptive model really digs into fundamental traits of people. 

Anyone can fall somewhere along a spectrum of each 5 traits as follows

• Openness to experience
• Conscientiousness
• Extraversion
• Agreeableness
• Neuroticism

4. Enneagram Personality Test

The Enneagram identifies nine distinct typologies. While the test has gained immense popularity over the past few years, it received less validation than models like the Big Five in mainstream academic psychology. But again, it is good to know yourself better based on nine archetypes of the Enneagram. 

1. Perfectionist
2. Giver
3. Achiever
4. Individualist
5. Investigator
6. Skeptic
7. Enthusiast
8. Challenger
9. Peacemaker

Each archetype is represented by a number because numbers are value neutral. This way of numbering can avoid negative connotations related to each trait, offering a simple way to describe personality. 

5. Keirsey Temperament Sorter

The Keirsey Temperament Sorter, created by David Keirsey, extends the MBTI's model. David groups 16 personalities into 4 distinct archetypes, including the Artisan, Idealist, Rational, Guardian.  

• Guardian: ESFJ, ISFJ, ESTJ, ISTJ
• Artisan: ESFP, ISFP, ESTP, ISTP
• Idealist: ENFP, INFP, ENFJ, INFJ
• Rational: ENTP, INTP, ENTJ, INTJ

6. Eysenck Personality Questionnaire

Eysenck personality questionnaire introduces three dimensions including Extraversion, Neuroticism, Psychoticism. These are also called superfactors of personality since it encompasses a wide range of more specific traits and behaviors.

• Extraversion: Describes how social and outgoing you are.
• Neuroticism: Describes the frequency to experience negative emotions or instability.
• Psychoticism: Describes how aggressive and interpersonally hostile you are.

7. Hogan Personality Inventory

Unlike aforementioned tests, HPI (Hogan Personality Inventory) takes into account both the bright sides (how we appear when at our best) and the dark sides (stress behaviors). 

• HPI: The bright side. The HPI tells test takers how they manage stress, interact,  approach tasks and solve problems.
• HDS: The dark side. The HDS tells people the behaviors that emerge during hard times which can potentially damage relationships and derail careers.
• MVPI: The inside. The MVPI describes one’s core values, goals and interests that determine satisfaction and drive careers.

HPI is often utilized to recognize job performance, leadership potential and career success. Thus, it is often used by businesses to detect the right candidates at the application or the interview round. 

Do This Test If You Feel Lost In Your Career

Finding the right job is never easy when your aptitude, interests and social expectations do not always align. Moreover, how you conduct yourself at the workplace is another factor to consider to find the right environment to flourish. There is no time to hesitate, take our DISC Test to get insights into your potential at work and how you work or communicate with colleagues. 

Upon finishing the DISC test, you can also have a glance at the Hogan Inventory to pinpoint leadership potential, work performance and what icks you when under stress. 

Read more: How each DISC personality leads?

Final Thoughts

Hopefully you have grasped basic differences and objectives of popular personality tests. The journey to true career and self happiness really takes off when you can see things in black and white. Don’t hesitate to continue exploring yourself through different tests available in the market including our tests. 

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

1. What is the most widely used personality test?

The MBTI is among the most popular personality tests. While this model is world famous, DISC is the number one test at the workplace. Nearly three-quarters of Fortune 500 companies have integrated DISC into their recruitment process. Some prime examples include AB Inbev, Apple, Microsoft and the list goes on.

2. Are personality tests scientifically validated?

Most of the time. Some popular personality tests like the Big Five originate from strong psychological bases while the others were mere assumptions of a limited number of psychologists/believers. DISC also stands out as a highly trusted test with 90% validation. 

3. What to use instead of Myers-Briggs?

The answer really depends on the outcomes you want. MBTI is used to analyze underlying motivations and behaviors while DISC focuses more on observable traits at work. If you want to know your fundamental characteristics, you can take the Big Five or the Eysenck Questionnaire. In case you want to explore how you will behave under pressure, make sure to check out the Hogan Inventory. 

Or you can combine all the results from different popular personality tests to fully understand yourself and make informed decisions in life.