4 A-levels

It really depends on the combination you do. If your subjects link well you shouldn't be working much harder than your friends who do 3

I did it and my advice is not to do it. Initially you may be able to balance your time and handle the work load, but taking another subject (which is unnecessary as most unis only want 3) will really start to bite when you're doing coursework and exams.

Difficulty depends on the individual subjects, although I would say that subjects such as maths that require loads of past paper revision become harder to fit in with 3 other competing subjects.

It can also damage your competitiveness. Let's say you want to go for a course that has entry requirements AAA. What the uni is really saying is, we want all your subjects to be at a minimum A standard. This means that if you do 4 and end up with AAAB you are potentially jeopardizing your application.

The only reason to take four A-levels is if two of those are Maths and Further Maths (and you're strongly considering applying to STEM courses or the top ~4 Economics courses). There is no benefit otherwise, and may well be a detriment due to being spread more thinly over your different subjects than with three.

What are the options you're considering anyway? If out of 4, 2 of them are easy for you, maybe you should carry on. But just know doing 4 will demand you do 3/2 hours everyday atleast, outside of lessons, just to stay on top of the work. Consider it carefully, since your AS grades will be what gets your application through to uni.

I am considering Maths, Literature, History and (4th) Government and Politics. I was told that I should do politics part as the extended project, do you think this is a good idea? thanks for replying btw.