Advance Estimates for GDP: How accurate have they been over the years?

Advance Estimates have accurately projected the real GDP growth rate in three of the past 12 years. In 2017-18, the second Advance Estimate was accurate, while the first one was not.
 

The growth rate was actually higher than the Advance Estimate for 2009-10. The first and second Advance Estimates were the same for 2019-20, but turned out to be wrong when the actual number came. It was probably because the first Advance Estimate came out on January 6 when the impact of Covid-19 was difficult to gauge.

 

However, the second Advance Estimate, presented on February 28, could not assess the impact. The data for 2020-21 will be released on Thursday.