What helps for tests is going to the discussions!! Many people found the questions on the exams unrelated to hw problems or problems Professor Padilla went over, but I personally was familiar with them because they had been discussed during discussions. Besides that, lectures mainly consisted of the professor going over problems the textbook went over. I think the professor explained concepts clearly and his accent was not a hinderance at all. I liked how the professor consistently expressed asking for help during office hours; I never went but it seemed like he really cared about students learning.

131B is definitely not an easy class. However, Padilla cared about out learning and he reminded us that he's not going to fail anyone. He curves the class to where most people will get A's and B's, and only a few will get C's. He told us that he will not fail anyone so he really cares about our learning.
He lectures with Apple Notes, which is quite odd and inefficient since he sometimes struggles to erase something from his notes. His lectures are pretty slow, and he does go overtime by 10 minutes often. He goes slow because he really wants us to learn and he doesn't want to rush any topics. Because of this, we didn't cover all the topics that we were supposed to cover so weeks 9-10 felt a little rushed. He does have an accent and his handwriting is a little sloppy but you get used to it. Aside from this, I think his lectures were pretty good. He tends to remind us every 10 minutes that if anything is unclear, then come to office hours, but he does that because he cares about us :]
The exams are tough, but that's to be expected with real analysis. There are 3 questions in each midterm. The first midterm had an average of 18.58/25 (74%) with a 18% standard deviation, but the second midterm was better with an average of 20.23/25 (81%) with a 12% standard deviation. Not sure what the final exam average was but he curved this class a lot. I got a B- with a 60% in the class.
We had 6 homeworks this quarter. The homework is difficult but our TA Raymond saved me this quarter. His discussions were helpful because he did some of the homework problems, and also he'll walk you through the homework solutions during his office hours. He hosted extra review sessions too!
Overall I would recommend this class. It's not easy but he won't fail anyone as long as you're trying. And if anything is unclear, then we can discuss this during office hours.

I have mixed opinions on Madrid Padilla. I felt his lectures were a bit slow but I guess better too slow than too fast. What irked me about his class was his exams. He would give a problem on the exam on material from the lecture right before the exam. It felt a bit weird because he would only really tell us the basic definitions of those concepts and thats about it. His homework schedule was very random as well. We had 6 homeworks total. He has a bit of an accent and I honestly found it hard to understand what he said sometimes. Also, his handwriting isn't amazing (but also isn't terrible!). With all that out of the way, he is one of the nicest professors I have had. He is VERY generous with grading. The medians for the two midterms were 19/25 and 21/25 and undetermined on the final. I scored a 22,21.5 and a 49/60 respectively. After calculating my final grade, I had a 87.3% so I should have gotten a B+ but I ended up with an A! Maybe the final exam had a very low average or something but regardless, I am very happy he curved so generously. He said he was not going to fail anyone and after discussing in the groupme, it seems like most people received A,A-,B+,B,B- My TA Robert Housden (Robbie) is one of my favourite TAs in the department. You can tell he cares about each student and really puts his all into it. His material was significantly easier than Raymond's (the other TAs) stuff. Raymond carried us for homework, essentially doing every problem during his office hours. Overall, I am quite happy with my experience with this course.

I took IB math A&A HL in high school and took this class as my first math class at UCLA. I thought it was at a good level and I did decently despite what everyone said about it being really challenging. I didn't find it too hard since I already knew about half from high school. I don't think the professor is very good at explaining the material, but he definitely tries his best. The nice thing about this professor was that the exams were very similar to the textbook problems, and before each exam he would write a list of problems to practice. I found that if you did the problems, the exams were very doable.

Padilla is a nice professor, and he clearly cares for his students- but I have to admit he is not great at lecturing and explaining mathematical concepts. The lectures were often very disjointed, with us jumping between different concepts. He often over complicated fairly simple topics, making them very hard to understand. The midterm and finals often covered these nebulous topics, making it significantly harder. The homework was easy, though you definitely need to do additional practice problems to prepare for exams. If you're okay self studying significant portions of the course, this class shouldn't be too hard for you. However I would not rely on Padilla to accurately explain ever concept to its fullest extent- even in office hours. Again, he is a nice professor and clearly wants his students to succeed; his lecturing and explaining skills just are lacking.

I hated this class. The lectures / material are honestly not too bad and the homework/weekly workload is minimal. The tests are hell. Way too hard for what the class is supposed to be teaching and it feels like a personal attack against you every time you take an exam (there are 2 midterms and a final). Padilla clearly loves math, but he is hard to understand and goes on tangents. In the end, I'm unsure if there are other professors that will give you a better experience but be prepared for a rough class if you decide to enroll.

Pros:

- The lecture material itself is pretty interesting. I don't know about previous reviews, but even though the prof. was sometimes unclear in his pronunciation of a few concepts and definitions, I believe he taught pretty well. I found his teaching to be pretty easy to follow along to (apart from a few instances where he made things more complicated than they had to be and I had to rely on my TA for an explanation).

- You don't have to buy the textbook, an online PDF is easily available.

- The homework problems aren't too bad.

Cons

-It takes a long of work to get an A in this class. While the content isn't difficult, Padilla gives pretty difficult tests so you need to review his lecture problems, textbook problems, and past exams (if you can find any) to help prepare yourself. If you do all of this, you'll be fine.

- He isn't really responsive but seems helpful during office hours (though, I didn't really go to one).

Note: See if you can get Steven Truong as your TA, he was great and answered all my questions over email super quick, even during the weekend.

Jose isn't a terrible lecturer though he gets very theoretical at times, and it gets difficult to follow. As a result, he has poor time management when it comes to lecture schedules and it feels as if he's rushing through the material right before the midterms. I feel that most of what I learned came from self-studying the material and doing additional practice problems besides the homework.

Overall, however, he's quite generous with grading (drops the lowest homework grade and curved the final). The exams are mostly fair, but they're much more difficult than the homework problems. One drawback is his grading system where the final exam is 45-55% of your grade, just pure insanity.

This is definitely not an easy class. To get a good grade, you need to do lots of practice (he usually assigns a ridiculous number of practice problems right before the midterms, and I tried to do some problems daily). The tests mostly involve concepts that can be found in the practice problems, usually with one or two curveball questions that are nothing like the practice problems. I found doing his practice midterms from 2019 (which can be found on his website) was really useful in preparing. The 45-55% allocated to the final was stressful, and should not be taken lightly.

Luckily, his curve is generous. I bombed one midterm but it was dropped. The final was technically out of 60 points but he took the score out of 55, giving everyone a 5 point buffer (no extra credit though). He tried not to fail anyone.

It is possible to get a good grade in this class, but know that your grade will be the result of the performance on two or three massive tests.

This class really put me through it. I took AP Calculus BC in high school and it was my favorite class of all time, but for whatever reason I just could not do well in this class. Maybe it was because the tests were hard and worth the majority of the final grade, but I think I have to attribute it to the professor's teaching style. Because the lectures were online and only a mere 50 minutes, lots of the content that was necessary to know for the exams was covered during office hours. There was always some little trick that would cost you an incredible amount of points if you didn't know it. As the quarter went on, we started to fall behind on the teaching schedule, so he taught us like 4 units worth of stuff the week before the final. Occasionally, he'd make an out of pocket comment that'd make us feel bad about ourselves, but I'd like to think he didn't mean it. Don't get me wrong, Jose is a great guy, I just don't think this year's teaching format was for him.