Burnout Profile · 24 Questions · 5 Minutes · Free
A 6-axis assessment of where exactly the fire is going out.
Burnout isn’t one thing — it’s six. The exhaustion that flattens you on Sunday night, the cynicism that quietly grows toward people you used to like, the body finally sending bills your mind has refused to pay — these are different dimensions of the same fire, and most burnout tests collapse them into a single number that hides exactly what is happening.
Click Begin the Test below. Answer for the last six months, not your worst single week — burnout is a state, not a moment.
A 5-minute burnout map
The Burnout Profile Test
Burnout isn't one thing — it's six. This test scores where exactly the fire is going out in your life right now, and reveals which of the eight burnout faces you're currently wearing.
Educational tool grounded in burnout research (Maslach, Demerouti, et al.). Not a clinical diagnosis. If you score extremely high, treat that as a signal to talk to someone — a doctor, therapist, or trusted person — not just to read advice cards.
Q1
Loading…
Your Burnout Profile
—
—
—
Total Burnout Pressure · 0%
Your Burnout Map
Each axis is one dimension of burnout. The further from center, the more that dimension is currently burning.
Your Two Hottest Dimensions
Targeted recovery moves for the two burnout dimensions scoring highest in your profile.
Want to understand each dimension before you start? Read the six dimensions · See the eight faces
The Six Dimensions, Briefly
These dimensions are drawn from the Maslach Burnout Inventory and the Job Demands-Resources model — the two most validated frameworks in occupational burnout research — extended with the somatic, meaning-related, and hyperactivation patterns that contemporary clinicians repeatedly see in people who say they are ‘burned out’ but score low on the classic three.
Emotional Exhaustion
Empty cup with no spring
The classic core of burnout — the feeling that the reservoir under your work has run dry. Tasks you used to do easily now extract everything you have. Recovery, on weekends and holidays, is incomplete. Pushing harder pulls from a well that is already empty.
In the wildSunday-night dread that has nothing to do with anything specific in the week ahead.
Cynicism & Detachment
Care has cost too much
Detachment as protection. Care once cost you, and your psyche has installed a leash on it. People you work with begin to register as obstacles or interruptions. Warmth becomes effortful. The leash protects you in the short run and slowly flattens you in the long run.
In the wildNoticing that a colleague’s problem registers internally as ‘an irritation’ before it registers as a problem.
Reduced Efficacy
Effort no longer adds up
Loss of contact with your own usefulness. The same hands that moved with confidence now move with second-guessing. Often this is exhaustion masquerading as incompetence — but if it goes on long enough, the mask becomes the face. You start delivering worse work because you’ve started believing you are worse.
In the wildRe-reading a perfectly competent piece of your own work and feeling vague embarrassment about it.
Body & Sleep Disruption
Your body is sending bills
Burnout in the body. Sleep that doesn’t restore. Catching every cold. Headaches, jaw tension, gut issues, drinking, eating, caffeine creeping upward. These are not separate inconveniences — they’re a single message in the only channel your body still trusts you to hear.
In the wildCatching the third cold of the season after two years of catching almost none.
Loss of Meaning
The why has come loose
The thread between work and meaning has frayed. This is not the same as cynicism — cynicism is a shield, meaninglessness is its mature form. The work feels small, successes register but don’t land, and the why you used to be able to articulate is now missing.
In the wildQuietly fantasizing about leaving the field entirely — not because of any specific grievance, just because the why has gone missing.
Hyperactivation
On all the time, present nowhere
The nervous system that won’t switch off. You check messages outside hours. You can’t fully relax. Even rest has acquired the texture of work — anticipated, optimized, frequently interrupted. Your body has learned that stillness is dangerous, and it can be unlearned, but the unlearning takes longer than you think.
In the wildLying in bed mentally drafting tomorrow’s first email at 11pm on a Saturday.
The Eight Faces
Most profiles resolve to one of six dominant-dimension faces. Two further results — The Recovering and The Fully Lit — are reserved for unusually balanced or unusually severe scoring patterns.
The Drained
Empty cup with no spring.
Emotional Exhaustion dominant. Your fire isn’t going out — it’s run out of fuel. The fix is rarely more discipline; it’s the un-glamorous, structural work of recovery: sleep, dropped obligations, and protected rest.
The Hardened
Care has cost too much.
Cynicism dominant. Care has cost too much, and you’ve put a leash on it. The fix is rarely warmth on demand; it’s selective re-investment in the few people and pieces of work that still feel real to you.
The Dimmed
Effort no longer adds up.
Reduced Efficacy dominant. You’ve lost contact with your own usefulness. The fix is rarely more skill-building; it’s distinguishing genuine incompetence from exhaustion wearing its mask, and treating the right one.
The Body Keeping Score
Your body is speaking now.
Somatic Burnout dominant. Your body is sending bills your mind has refused to pay. The fix starts with seeing a doctor — not to perform burnout self-diagnosis on potentially treatable physical issues.
The Untethered
The why has slipped its mooring.
Loss of Meaning dominant. The why has slipped its mooring. The fix is rarely changing jobs; it’s recovering the meaning already there — or admitting honestly when it has gone for good.
The Wired
On all the time, present nowhere.
Hyperactivation dominant. Your nervous system can’t switch off. The fix is rarely better time management; it’s structural rituals that train your body to remember what stillness feels like.
The Recovering
Old fire, banked low and steady.
Rare result. No single dimension is in the danger zone. Either you’ve already done the recovery work and are now in a sustainable cadence, or you’ve recently stepped back from a harder season. This is the territory worth defending.
The Fully Lit
All six dimensions burning at once.
Five or more dimensions burning at once. This is not a moment for nuance or small habits. What is needed is a structural intervention — a leave, a role change, a deliberate downgrade of demands. Tell someone. Get real support.
Why a Six-Dimension Test Matters
Most online burnout tests give you a single number — a percentage, a stoplight color, a label. The number is a comfort: it lets you point to a thing. But burnout is not a thing. It’s a constellation, and treating the constellation as a single dot is exactly how people end up doing the wrong recovery work for years.
An exhausted burnout needs sleep, dropped obligations, and time. A cynical burnout needs selective re-investment in people. A somatic burnout needs a doctor. A meaning burnout needs the slow work of finding the why again — which doesn’t always end with the same job.
These recoveries do not interchange. Sleep does not fix meaninglessness. New purpose does not fix a depleted nervous system. The point of mapping six dimensions independently is so you can spend your limited recovery energy on what is actually broken — not on a generic prescription that misses the specific shape of your fire.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is this a clinical or scientific assessment?
No. It’s an educational tool grounded in well-validated burnout frameworks — the Maslach Burnout Inventory, the Job Demands-Resources model, and contemporary clinical observations on somatic and meaning-related burnout. It is not a diagnostic instrument and is not intended to replace one. If your scores are very high, please talk to a professional.
How long does the test take?
About five minutes. There are 24 short statements scored on a five-point Disagree-to-Agree scale. You can go back and change any answer until you reach the result.
Should I answer for today, or for the whole year?
For the last six months, weighted toward recent weeks. Burnout is a state, not a single bad moment — answering based only on your worst week or your best week will distort the result.
Why six dimensions instead of three?
The classic Maslach Burnout Inventory measures three: exhaustion, cynicism, and reduced efficacy. Contemporary research consistently finds three additional patterns that the original three miss — somatic disruption, meaning loss, and hyperactivation. People who score ‘low burnout’ on a three-axis test but feel deeply burned out usually score high on one of these other three.
What if my top score is tied between two dimensions?
The face defaults to the dimension listed first. The ‘Two Hottest Dimensions’ section shows both regardless of any tie.
Are my answers stored anywhere?
No. The entire test runs in your browser. Nothing is sent to a server, no account is needed, and reloading the page wipes your answers.
What if I score very high — 'Fully Lit'?
Treat that as a signal to talk to someone, not to read more advice cards. A doctor, a therapist, a trusted person who can help you make a structural change. Severe multi-dimensional burnout is not a habit-tweaking problem; it usually requires a bigger intervention.
Where can I learn more?
Christina Maslach’s The Truth About Burnout, Emily and Amelia Nagoski’s Burnout, and Anna Lembke’s Dopamine Nation are good starting points covering the occupational, somatic, and nervous-system angles respectively.