Management: CAT Exam

CAT stands for Common Aptitude Test and is an entrance test for admission in Tier-1 Colleges this exam is organised by top IIMs and IITs and so many other top colleges pan India last the responsibilities were on IIM Calcutta. It is the most popular entrance exam as every year lakhs of students are applying for the exam.

The difficulty level of the exam is quite high, with a success rate of less than 5% the exam is conducted on a single day in three sessions at about 400 test centres in more than 150 cities across India.  The exam is designed to analyse the verbal, quantitative and analytical skills. Apart from MBA programs, the CAT score is valid for Executive MBA, PhD, and FPM programmes in IIM and so many other B-schools.

Key Highlights of the Exam

Eligibility Criteria

Candidates must satisfy the following eligibility criteria to appear in the exam:-

• Must hold a bachelor’s degree in any field with marks not less than 50% (for Unreserved Quota) and 45% (for Reserved Quota).
• The degree must be from any recognised university
• Candidates who are in the final year of their degree/ result can also apply for the same 
• There is no age limit for the exam

Exam Pattern

The exam comprises 66 MCQ and Non-MCQ questions, medium of the answer is English, and some TITA (type in the answer) require direct answers, the detailed exam pattern is mentioned below:-

CAT Syllabus

Preparation Tips for CAT Exam

The CAT exam is a hard nut to crack, more than lakh students are applying for the exam, which makes the exam way more competitive than other exams, it demands consistency, dedication, commitment, and more than that a structured blueprint to crack the exam. Below are some techniques that help you to ace your preparation:-

• First you need to go through the syllabus and identify your weaknesses and strengths.
• Study the exam pattern to know the type of questions frequently asked in the exam.
• Dedicate at least 6 to 8 hours daily to the preparation
• Use the Pomodoro technique (25 minutes study 5 minutes break) for effective learning
• Try to attempt mock tests as much as you can.
• Go through the PYQs to make exam strategies
• It is just an exam so, don’t take too much stress take complete 7 to 8 hours of sleep.

Section-Wise Book Suggestions

Data Interpretation & Logical Reasoning 

• Data Interpretation by Nishit Sinha
• Logical Reasoning and Data Interpretation for the CAT by Nishit Sinha
• How to Prepare for Logical Reasoning for CAT book by Arun Sharma
• A Modern Approach to Logical Reasoning by R.S. Agarwal

Verbal Ability & Reading Comprehension (VARC)

• High School Grammar and Composition by Wren and Martin
• Word Power Made Easy by Norman Lewis
• How to Prepare for Verbal Ability and Reading Comprehension for the CAT by Arun Sharma and Meenakshi Upadhyay
• Read books from different genres

Quantitative Ability

• Quantitative Aptitude Quantum CAT by Sarvesh Verma
• How to Prepare for Quantitative Aptitude for the CAT by Arun Sharma
• Quantitative Aptitude for Competitive Examinations by Abhijit Guha

Colleges Accepts CAT Score Card

• Lloyd Business School (LBS) Grater Noida
• Thiagarajar School of Management (TSM) Madurai
• Bharathidasan Institute of Management
• Rajagiri Business School (RBS) Kochi
• Panjab University Chandigarh
• Babasaheb Bhimrao Ambedkar University (BBAU) Lucknow
• The National Institute of Bank Management (NIBM) Pune
• National Institute of Technology Calicut (NITC) Kozhikode
• Saveetha Institute of Medical and Technical Sciences Chennai
• Malaviya National Institute of Technology (MNIT) Jaipur