OCD Test (OCI-R)

How the OCI-R is calculated

The OCI-R has 18 statements. You rate each one from 0 (not at all) to 4 (extremely), reflecting how distressing the experience was over the past month. The scores sum to a total between 0 and 72.

The 18 items map to 6 subscales of 3 items each: Hoarding (items 1, 7, 13), Checking (2, 8, 14), Ordering (3, 9, 15), Counting (4, 10, 16), Washing (5, 11, 17), and Obsessing (6, 12, 18). The total score is the primary number doctors use; the subscale pattern can hint at which symptom dimension dominates, but you don’t need to interpret it yourself — that’s a clinician’s job.

The cut-off for a positive screen is ≥ 21 (Foa 2002, validated against the much-longer Yale-Brown Obsessive-Compulsive Scale). At this threshold, sensitivity is around 65–74% and specificity around 64–75% in mixed clinical samples — solid for a screener that takes 3 minutes.

What your score means

Higher scores correlate with longer time spent on rituals, more disability in daily life, and stronger response to specialist treatment when started early.

When this test is most useful — and when it isn’t

The OCI-R is most useful when:

• You suspect a pattern of unwanted thoughts driving repeated actions, but you’re unsure whether it counts as a disorder
• You want a baseline before starting therapy or medication, so you can track movement
• You’re returning to the doctor and want a concrete number to point at, instead of describing 18 things from memory

It is less useful when:

• You’re in crisis right now (suicidal thoughts, severe distress) — call a crisis line first; testing comes later
• The patterns you have are situational and recent (e.g., post-bereavement) — they may resolve on their own
• You’re a child or teenager — use the OCI-CV (Children’s Version) instead
• Your distressing thoughts are about trauma — the PC-PTSD-5 may fit better

OCD vs anxiety vs autism — what’s overlap and what’s different

OCD shares features with several conditions, which is why the OCI-R is a screen, not a diagnosis:

• Generalized anxiety — both involve worry, but OCD has specific obsessions linked to specific compulsions, while anxiety is more diffuse
• Autism — autistic people often have ordering or routine preferences (overlap with items 3, 9, 15), but they aren’t usually anxiety-driven
• Hoarding disorder — often co-occurs with OCD but is now a separate diagnosis (DSM-5)
• Body dysmorphic disorder — has obsession-compulsion structure but focused on appearance

A clinician untangles these. The treatment differs: ERP for OCD, CBT for anxiety, autism support for autism, and so on.

Related tests

• GAD-7 anxiety test — 7-question generalized anxiety screen, often co-occurring with OCD
• PHQ-9 depression test — depression frequently co-occurs with severe OCD
• Autism AQ-10 test — autistic ordering preferences can look like OCD ordering compulsions
• PSS-10 stress test — chronic stress amplifies OCD symptoms

Sources verified: 2026-05-02

The OCI-R was developed by Edna Foa and colleagues at the University of Pennsylvania in 2002, replacing the original 42-item OCI with a much shorter 18-item version that retains strong psychometric properties. It has since been validated in primary-care, college, and clinical samples worldwide. NICE (UK) and the Academy of Cognitive and Behavioral Therapies recommend it as a screening tool for adult OCD.

Privacy

Calculation runs entirely in your browser. We never see, log, or store your individual answers. Anonymous, aggregate events (e.g., which severity band your result fell into) help us improve the tool. This is informational, not medical advice.