Subject-Verb Agreement with Percentages and Fractions
5 exercises — practise agreement with percentage and fraction subjects in technical metrics reporting.
0 / 20 completed
1 / 20
Choose the sentence with correct subject-verb agreement.
"Fifty percent of the requests are timing out" is correct: with percentage subjects, the verb agrees with the noun after "of" — here the plural "requests" takes the plural verb "are". Option B incorrectly uses the singular "is" with the plural "requests". Option C uses the singular "request", which does not match the meaning of a percentage of many requests, and pairs it inconsistently with a plural verb. Option D is a garbled, doubled construction that is not a coherent sentence.
2 / 20
Which sentence correctly applies subject-verb agreement with a percentage of an uncountable noun?
"Ten percent of the bandwidth is reserved for monitoring traffic" is correct: "bandwidth" is uncountable, so it takes the singular verb "is", regardless of the percentage value. Option B incorrectly uses the plural "are" with the uncountable, singular-agreeing "bandwidth". Option C pluralizes "bandwidths", which is not standard usage for this mass noun in this sense, and mismatches it with a singular verb. Option D drops the article and uses a plural verb, which is inconsistent with the uncountable noun.
3 / 20
Select the sentence with correct agreement in a QA report describing test coverage.
"A third of the test cases still fail on the staging environment" is correct: the fraction "a third of" takes its agreement from the plural noun "test cases", so the plural verb "fail" is required. Option B incorrectly uses the singular "fails" with a plural noun. Option C uses the singular "test case" but keeps a plural verb, an inconsistent combination. Option D omits the finite auxiliary needed for a complete verb phrase, leaving an incomplete sentence.
4 / 20
Which sentence correctly applies agreement when the percentage refers to an uncountable abstract noun?
"Only twenty percent of the feedback was actionable" is correct: "feedback" is uncountable, so it takes the singular verb "was", matching the noun after "of" rather than the numeral. Option B uses the plural "were", which mismatches the uncountable "feedback". Option C incorrectly pluralizes "feedback" as "feedbacks", which is nonstandard, and keeps a singular verb inconsistently paired with a plural-looking noun. Option D drops the article and uses a plural verb, both inconsistent with the uncountable noun.
5 / 20
Choose the sentence with correct subject-verb agreement in an incident summary.
"Nearly ninety percent of the servers were affected by the outage" is correct: the plural noun "servers" after "of" determines plural agreement, so "were" is required. Option B incorrectly uses the singular "was" with a plural noun. Option C uses the singular "server", which contradicts the meaning of "ninety percent of" many servers, and mismatches it with a plural verb. Option D uses a non-finite "being affected" with no finite auxiliary, leaving the sentence incomplete.
6 / 20
John reported that the new feature's adoption rate is 75%. He wants to update the documentation. Which sentence uses correct subject-verb agreement?
Subject-verb agreement dictates that a singular subject (John) takes a singular verb (is). Using 'are' creates a grammatical error. The phrase 'being' is an infinitive and doesn't fit the context here; it's frequently confused with 'is' in this type of exercise.
7 / 20
Sarah from QA sent a Slack message: 'The memory usage increased by 25% after the last deployment. We need to investigate further.' Which sentence demonstrates correct subject-verb agreement in this scenario?
Here, 'memory usage' is treated as a singular concept. Therefore, the verb must agree with that singular noun. 'Have been' correctly indicates an ongoing state of increase. Options 1 and 2 incorrectly use 'is' and 'are' respectively, while option 4 implies a completed action.
8 / 20
Mark wrote the following PR description: 'The API response time decreased by 15%. This improvement significantly impacts user experience.' Which sentence best demonstrates correct subject-verb agreement within this context?
'Response time' functions as a singular unit of measurement. Thus, the verb 'is' is appropriate. The other options incorrectly use plural forms, suggesting multiple response times are being affected. This highlights the importance of understanding how nouns are used within technical descriptions.
9 / 20
David in the standup update said: 'The error rate dropped to 2% during testing. This is a positive trend.' Which of the following sentences demonstrates correct subject-verb agreement?
'Error rate' refers to a single measurement. Consequently, 'is' is the correct verb form. Using 'are' would be incorrect and suggests multiple distinct error rates are being considered – which isn't the intended meaning in this context. Option 4 incorrectly uses an infinitive.
10 / 20
Emily drafted an incident summary: 'The system downtime was 8%. The root cause analysis revealed a configuration error.' Which sentence demonstrates correct subject-verb agreement?
'Downtime' is a singular metric representing the duration of system unavailability. Therefore, 'is' is the correct verb form. The other options incorrectly use plural forms, implying multiple instances of downtime are being discussed. This reinforces the core rule: singular nouns take singular verbs.
11 / 20
John reported that the new feature's adoption rate is 75%. He wants to update the documentation. Which sentence uses correct subject-verb agreement?
Subject-verb agreement dictates that a singular subject (John) takes a singular verb (is). Using 'are' creates a grammatical error. The phrase 'being' is an infinitive and doesn't fit the context here; it's frequently confused with 'is' in this type of exercise.
12 / 20
Sarah from QA sent a Slack message: 'The memory usage increased by 25% after the last deployment. We need to investigate further.' Which sentence demonstrates correct subject-verb agreement in this scenario?
Here, 'memory usage' is treated as a singular concept. Therefore, the verb must agree with that singular noun. 'Have been' correctly indicates an ongoing state of increase. Options 1 and 2 incorrectly use 'is' and 'are' respectively, while option 4 implies a completed action.
13 / 20
Mark wrote the following PR description: 'The API response time decreased by 15%. This improvement significantly impacts user experience.' Which sentence best demonstrates correct subject-verb agreement within this context?
'Response time' functions as a singular unit of measurement. Thus, the verb 'is' is appropriate. The other options incorrectly use plural forms, suggesting multiple response times are being affected. This highlights the importance of understanding how nouns are used within technical descriptions.
14 / 20
David in the standup update said: 'The error rate dropped to 2% during testing. This is a positive trend.' Which of the following sentences demonstrates correct subject-verb agreement?
'Error rate' refers to a single measurement. Consequently, 'is' is the correct verb form. Using 'are' would be incorrect and suggests multiple distinct error rates are being considered – which isn't the intended meaning in this context. Option 4 incorrectly uses an infinitive.
15 / 20
Emily drafted an incident summary: 'The system downtime was 8%. The root cause analysis revealed a configuration error.' Which sentence demonstrates correct subject-verb agreement?
'Downtime' is a singular metric representing the duration of system unavailability. Therefore, 'is' is the correct verb form. The other options incorrectly use plural forms, implying multiple instances of downtime are being discussed. This reinforces the core rule: singular nouns take singular verbs.
16 / 20
John reported that the new feature's adoption rate is 75%. He wants to update the documentation. Which sentence uses correct subject-verb agreement?
Subject-verb agreement dictates that a singular subject (John) takes a singular verb (is). Using 'are' creates a grammatical error. The phrase 'being' is an infinitive and doesn't fit the context here; it's frequently confused with 'is' in this type of exercise.
17 / 20
Sarah from QA sent a Slack message: 'The memory usage increased by 25% after the last deployment. We need to investigate further.' Which sentence demonstrates correct subject-verb agreement in this scenario?
Here, 'memory usage' is treated as a singular concept. Therefore, the verb must agree with that singular noun. 'Have been' correctly indicates an ongoing state of increase. Options 1 and 2 incorrectly use 'is' and 'are' respectively, while option 4 implies a completed action.
18 / 20
Mark wrote the following PR description: 'The API response time decreased by 15%. This improvement significantly impacts user experience.' Which sentence best demonstrates correct subject-verb agreement within this context?
'Response time' functions as a singular unit of measurement. Thus, the verb 'is' is appropriate. The other options incorrectly use plural forms, suggesting multiple response times are being affected. This highlights the importance of understanding how nouns are used within technical descriptions.
19 / 20
David in the standup update said: 'The error rate dropped to 2% during testing. This is a positive trend.' Which of the following sentences demonstrates correct subject-verb agreement?
'Error rate' refers to a single measurement. Consequently, 'is' is the correct verb form. Using 'are' would be incorrect and suggests multiple distinct error rates are being considered – which isn't the intended meaning in this context. Option 4 incorrectly uses an infinitive.
20 / 20
Emily drafted an incident summary: 'The system downtime was 8%. The root cause analysis revealed a configuration error.' Which sentence demonstrates correct subject-verb agreement?
'Downtime' is a singular metric representing the duration of system unavailability. Therefore, 'is' is the correct verb form. The other options incorrectly use plural forms, implying multiple instances of downtime are being discussed. This reinforces the core rule: singular nouns take singular verbs.
What will I practise in "Subject-Verb Agreement with Percentages and Fractions — IT Grammar Exercise"?
Practise choosing singular or plural verb agreement with "percent of" and fraction constructions based on the countability of the following noun, in metrics
How many exercises are in this module?
This module has 20 multiple-choice exercises, each with instant feedback and a full explanation of the correct answer.
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