CAT is the Common Admission Test. It is one of the most competitive and popular tests among the students who want to seek admission into 160 b-schools in India. In CAT Exam or in CAT Syllabus consists of three sections – Verbal Ability and Reading Comprehension (VARC), Data Interpretation and Logical Reasoning (DLIR), and Quantitative Ability (QA) and it is offered once a year, usually in the month of November/December. CAT is established and organized by the Indian Institute of Management (IIMs) for admitting students for their MBA or PGDM. One of the IIMs conducts or manages the CAT every year as maintained by the policy of rotation.
CAT is a national-level test. There are around 244,000 annual test-takers of CAT. Initially, i.e before 2009, the Common Admission Test was a paper-based test. Later, on 1st May 2009, it was declared that CAT would be conducted as a computer-based test. The duration of the test is 3 hours, 1 hour for each section. The candidates must make a note that CAT has a sectional cut-off. One must secure a minimum score to clear that particular section and hence the overall CAT. The candidates who achieve the sectional cut-off, as well as the overall cut-off, are further selected for the Group Discussion (GD) or Personal Interview (PI) by the IIMs.
However, the CAT 2022 notification is expected to be announced in the month of July 2022. The registrations for the same will be initiated from the second week of August. The deadline for registering will be by the end of September and there will be a 10 days correction window succeeding the deadline for the students to rectify the mistakes made during registration. CAT 2022 will be held in the last week of November and the results are anticipated around the first week of January 2023.
Changes in CAT Syllabus:
Some changes are anticipated in the syllabus of CAT exam in 2021. In 2020, due to the COVID-19 outbreak, IIM Indore decided to conduct CAT within a duration of 2 hours. CAT 2020 included only 76 questions with a maximum score of 228 marks. There were 26 questions each in the VARC and the Quantitative Ability section of CAT 2020 whereas The DILR section consisted of 24 questions.
However, there are some important changes in CAT 2021 which include that the test duration will be of 3 hours and 1 hour will be allotted to each section. There will be a total of 100 questions which will hold the maximum score of 300 marks. The VARC and the QA sections will include 34 questions each and the DILR section will comprise 32 questions.
| Section | Duration | Number of Questions | Maximum marks | Difficulty level |
| Quantitative Aptitude (QA) | 60 minutes | 34 | 102 | Moderate |
| Verbal Ability & Reading Comprehension (VARC) | 60 minutes | Verbal Ability – 10Reading Comprehension – 24 | 102 | Moderate |
| Data Interpretation & Logical Reasoning (DILR) | 60 minutes | Data Interpretation – 16Logical Reasoning – 16 | 96 | Moderate to difficult |
| Total | 180 minutes (3 hours) | 100 | 300 |
Overview of CAT Syllabus for the year 2022:
It is very important for the candidates to understand the pattern and syllabus thoroughly in order to score high and crack the CAT for getting into the top and reputed B-schools of India. The syllabus of CAT exam for year 2022 is vast and therefore the candidate is required to dedicate around nine to twelve months to CAT preparation. He/she must sincerely spend 8 to 10 hours studying for 5 days a week during these months. Following is the overview of the topics in each section:
| Quantitative Aptitude (QA) | Verbal Ability & Reading Comprehension (VARC) | Data Interpretation & Logical Reasoning (DILR) |
| Geometry | Reading comprehension | Blood Relations |
| Arithmetic Progression and Geometric progression | Fill in the blanks | Coding-Decoding |
| Profit and loss, pipes and cisterns | Sentence correction | Clocks and calendars |
| Time and work | Word-meaning | Venn diagrams |
| Allegations and mixtures | Vocabulary based questions | Sitting Arrangements (linear and circular) |
| Averages, Percentages | Analogy | Binary Logic |
| Simple and Compound interest | Para Jumble | Sequence and series |
| Number system | Cloze test | Direction sense |
| Equations | English grammar and usage | Case lets, pie chart, line graph |
Section-wise detailed CAT Syllabus 2022
Explanation of QA, VARC, DI, and LR Section in detail:
Quantitative Aptitude (QA):
The QA section consists of numerical-based questions from different math concepts and topics. The syllabus of CAT exam of this section is very vast and has the topics and concepts which were covered in the 10th and 12th standards. There are around 10-12 questions here which are non-MCQ types questions. These non-MCQ types questions do not carry negative markings. Following are the topics and concepts covered in this section:
- Averages
- Ratio & Proportion
- Speed, Time, and Distance
- Time and Work
- LCM and HCF
- Percentages, Profit and Loss
- Interest (Simple and Compound)
- Number System
- Algebra
- Geometry/Mensuration
- Venn diagrams and other topics
- Linear Equations; Quadratic Equations Complex Numbers
- Logarithm; Progressions
- Binomial Theorem
- Surds and Indices; Inequalities
- Permutation and Combination
- Probability Functions
- Set Theory; Mixtures and Alligations
- Coordinate Geometry
- Trigonometry
In this, geometry is the most important topic followed by algebra and the Number system. There are 2-3 questions based on Number System and Algebra each whereas 4-5 questions are based on Geometry. There are 1 to 2 questions based on the rest of the topics. The level of questions in the QA section generally scales from easy to moderately high. The questions are mainly based on the application of mathematics in order to decipher real-time problems.
Verbal Ability and Reading Comprehension (VARC)
The prime focus of this section is on the English language skills of the candidates and examines how well they can interpret paragraphs and understand the fundamental ideas. The VARC section has five long and short English Comprehension passages. There are 6 questions that are based on each long passage and 3 questions are based on each short passage. The long RC passages are 900 words whereas the shorter passages are around 600 words.
The verbal ability part of this section consists of individual questions that cover different areas of English language grammar and usage. There are around 7-8 questions in this section in which the candidate will not be provided with the options and needs to type the answers. Following are topics that are included in the VARC section:
- Inferences, Statements, Arguments
- The main idea in the RC Passage
- Author’s assumption
- Synonyms-antonyms
- Meaning of the phrase
- Para Summary
- Jumbled paragraphs
- Pick Out of Context Sentence
- Error Correction in Sentences
- Sequence of sentences
- Fill in the blanks
- Completion of Paragraph
- Analogies
- Critical Reasoning
- Sentence Completion
- Irrelevant Statements
- Vocabulary usage
Out of this, there are 10 to 12 questions based on the Inferences, Statements, and Arguments. The English Reading comprehension passages in the CAT syllabus are usually included from a wide area which includes, current affairs, Literature, Business Economy, different literature books, passages from science and culture, some fiction passages which make the candidate think according to the author’s perspective, some historical events like the French revolution, and passages on mythology. The RC Passage-based questions are of MCQ type and include 1/3rd negative marking. The questions included in this section are moderately difficult as well as time-consuming.
Data interpretation and Logical Reasoning
This section in CAT syllabus has two parts – Data Interpretation and Logical Reasoning. Each part consists of 16 questions. This section in syllabus of CAT exam includes the questions in which the data is already given. It tests the ability of the candidate to interpret the data in the right way and also examines logical reasoning. These types of questions help to understand the candidate’s ability to understand the problem statement properly;y and solve it logically. They can be easily solved and the candidates can highly score in this section. Following are the topics covered in this section:
- Bar charts – Simple, Stacked, Composite Bar charts
- Pie charts
- Caselets
- Data Analysis
- Data comparison from Table
- Graphs
- Direction sense
- Team formation
- Seating Arrangement
- Blood Relation
- Clocks
- Calendars
- Binary logic
- Logical Sequence
- Assumption
- Premise
- Conclusion
- Linear and matrix arrangement
- Input-Output
- Series
- Syllogism
- Cubes
- Rows
- Set Theory
- Venn Diagrams
3 to 4 questions are based on each topic mentioned above. The data interpretation section is a bit difficult and time-consuming but is highly scored if solved cautiously as one mistake may lead to incorrect answering for the whole set.
CAT Syllabus in Pdf
Here is the CAT Exam Syllabus Pdf below, which you can download while clicking this download button
