PHQ-9 vs GAD-7: Which Screening Questionnaire Fits What You're Feeling
Two short questionnaires used together in most primary care visits, because the conditions they screen for overlap in more than half of cases.
The short answer
The PHQ-9 screens for depression and the GAD-7 screens for generalized anxiety. Choose by what is dominating: if the main experience is low mood, loss of interest, or nothing feeling worth doing, the PHQ-9 is the closer fit; if it is persistent worry, restlessness, and being unable to switch off, the GAD-7 is. If both describe you, take both — that is what clinicians do, because depression and anxiety co-occur in roughly half of presentations, and the pair together says more than either alone. Neither is a diagnostic instrument. Both are short screening questionnaires that indicate whether a fuller conversation with a clinician is warranted, and a score above a cutoff is a reason to have that conversation, not a diagnosis you have received.
What each one asks about
Both use the same response format — how often, over the last two weeks, each item has bothered you, from 'not at all' to 'nearly every day'. That shared format is deliberate: it lets a clinician administer both in about three minutes and compare them directly.
The PHQ-9's nine items map one-to-one onto the DSM criteria for a major depressive episode: mood, loss of interest, sleep, energy, appetite, self-worth, concentration, psychomotor change, and thoughts of self-harm. That last item is why the PHQ-9 is treated with more care than a typical questionnaire — it is a direct question about suicidal ideation, and any non-zero answer is treated as needing follow-up regardless of the total.
The GAD-7's seven items are about the machinery of worry rather than its content: nervousness, inability to stop worrying, worrying about too many different things, trouble relaxing, restlessness, irritability, and a sense of dread. It asks how the worry behaves, not what it is about, which is what makes it a measure of generalized anxiety rather than of any specific fear.
Why the two overlap so much
People are often surprised to score in a similar range on both. This is expected. Depression and anxiety share a large common factor — sometimes called negative affectivity or internalising — and in epidemiological samples the majority of people meeting criteria for one also meet criteria for the other at some point. The questionnaires are not failing to discriminate; the conditions genuinely co-occur.
They also share symptoms outright. Sleep disturbance, concentration problems, irritability and fatigue appear in both presentations, so an identical experience can raise both totals. That is a reason to read the pattern rather than the two numbers: which items you endorsed most strongly, and which cluster started first, is usually more informative than the totals.
This overlap is also why a single high score should not be treated as identifying a condition. Both instruments are designed to be sensitive — to catch as many people who need follow-up as possible — which necessarily means a meaningful share of high scorers do not turn out to have the disorder on fuller assessment. Being over a cutoff means 'worth investigating', which is the job the instrument was built for.
How to read a score without over-reading it
Both use bands rather than a single pass-fail line, and the bands are conventions for guiding a conversation, not thresholds where a condition switches on. On both instruments the commonly used cut points fall at 5, 10, 15 and 20 for minimal, mild, moderate and severe ranges — with 10 the value most often used as the point where follow-up is generally recommended.
Two limits are worth knowing. First, the window is the last two weeks, which means the score is a measure of a recent state and not of you as a person: a difficult fortnight will raise it and that is the instrument working correctly. Second, the score cannot tell you why. A high PHQ-9 accompanying grief, a thyroid problem, chronic pain, a new medication or sustained sleep deprivation looks identical to one accompanying a depressive episode, and distinguishing those is exactly the work a clinician does and a questionnaire cannot.
Retaking after a few weeks is often more informative than a single administration, which is why these two are used to track response to treatment. A total moving down five points means something clearer than any single score does.
Side by side
| Aspect | PHQ-9 | GAD-7 |
|---|---|---|
| Screens for | Depression — major depressive episode severity. | Generalized anxiety disorder. |
| Length and window | 9 items, last two weeks. | 7 items, last two weeks. |
| Core experience | Low mood, loss of interest, nothing feels worth doing. | Worry that will not stop, restlessness, inability to relax. |
| Includes a safety item | Yes — item 9 asks directly about thoughts of self-harm. | No. |
| Take it when | Mood and motivation are the main problem. | Anticipation and tension are the main problem. |
Common questions
- Can I take both the PHQ-9 and the GAD-7?
- Yes, and it is often the more useful choice. Primary care commonly administers them together because depression and anxiety co-occur frequently and share several symptoms, so the pair distinguishes what a single questionnaire cannot. Together they take about three minutes. Read them as a pattern rather than a competition — which items you endorsed most strongly matters more than which total came out higher.
- What does a score of 10 mean on either questionnaire?
- On both instruments 10 is the value most often used as the point where clinical follow-up is generally recommended, sitting at the boundary between the mild and moderate bands. It does not mean a condition has been identified. Both are built to be sensitive, so a meaningful proportion of people scoring at or above 10 will not meet criteria for the disorder on fuller assessment — the score's job is to flag that a conversation is worth having, and the assessment happens in that conversation.
- Are these questionnaires a diagnosis?
- No. Both are screening questionnaires. A diagnosis requires a clinical assessment that establishes duration, rules out physical causes such as thyroid dysfunction or medication effects, considers grief and life circumstances, and evaluates how much daily functioning is affected — none of which a self-report total can do. The instruments are used within that process, most often to decide whether it should begin and later to track whether treatment is working.
- What should I do if item 9 on the PHQ-9 applies to me?
- Treat it as reason to talk to someone now rather than to wait for a score. Any non-zero answer on that item is followed up regardless of the total, which is how it is handled clinically. In the US, call or text 988 for the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline, available 24 hours. Outside the US, findahelpline.com lists free services by country. If there is immediate danger, emergency services are the right call.
Measure it on yourself
Reading about a trait and seeing your own score are different things. These assessments cover what this article describes.
PHQ-9 Depression Screening — Free, Confidential
The most widely used depression screening tool in clinical practice, with over 30,000 research citations. Answer for how often each has applied over the past two weeks.
9 items · 2 min · 3 sub-scales
GAD-7 Anxiety Screening — Free, Confidential
The global standard for generalized anxiety screening, with over 20,000 citations. Answer for how often each has applied over the past two weeks.
7 items · 2 min · 3 sub-scales
PSS-10 Perceived Stress Scale — Free Screening
The most cited measure of perceived stress worldwide, with over 30,000 citations. Measures how unpredictable and overwhelming you have found the past month.
10 items · 2 min · 2 sub-scales
Read next
- The instrumentsThe Depression Screening Questionnaire, ExplainedNine questions, two weeks, one number — and a clear line between what that number screens for and what it cannot diagnose.
- ExplainersWhat a High Neuroticism Score Actually MeansThe least flattering name in personality psychology, attached to the trait that predicts the most.
- ComparisonsIntrovert or Socially Anxious? The Difference Is Whether You Want ToThe two produce the same declined invitation for entirely different reasons, and only one of them is treatable.
Sources
- Kroenke, K., Spitzer, R. L., & Williams, J. B. W. (2001). The PHQ-9: Validity of a brief depression severity measure. Journal of General Internal Medicine, 16(9).
- Spitzer, R. L., Kroenke, K., Williams, J. B. W., & Löwe, B. (2006). A brief measure for assessing generalized anxiety disorder: the GAD-7. Archives of Internal Medicine, 166(10).
- Kroenke, K., Spitzer, R. L., Williams, J. B. W., & Löwe, B. (2010). The Patient Health Questionnaire somatic, anxiety, and depressive symptom scales: a systematic review. General Hospital Psychiatry, 32(4).
Last reviewed 2026-08-07. This article is general information about psychological measurement, not medical or psychological advice.