PAT, 3 Interviews.
A number of physics questions.
Challenging physics questions from the PAT or Physics Olympiad. Mock interviews.
Practice with challenging questions.
Remember this advice isn't official. There is no guarantee it will reflect your experience because university applications can change between years. Check the official Cambridge and Oxford websites for more accurate information on this year's application format and the required tests.
Also, someone else's experience may not reflect your own. Most interviews are more like conversations than tests and like, any conversation, they are quite interactive.
Test taken: Physics Aptitude Test (
Number of interviews: 3
Time between interviews: I was there for 2 nights, and since the interviews were spread out there was long breaks between them.
Length of interviews: 20 minutes
Online interview: No
I was given physics questions to think about and talk through in front of them, with the interviewers giving pointers where necessary. This was the format of all the interviews, no mention of my personal statement.
The main thing was just pushing myself with difficult questions as much as possible, whether inside or outside of lessons. Practice/past PAT papers were good for this, as well as other challenge papers like the Olympiad.
Practice papers and as many challenging questions as possible from various papers
Push your mind as much as possible (within reason), through practicing challenging questions and learning new concepts. The more you practice, the more comfortable you will be facing challenging questions, and therefore the more comfortable you will be in your interview, which is crucial.