CAT Exam Analysis

CAT Previous Year Exam Analysis is one of the most important strategies to ace CAT 2022. By checking the CAT exam analysis, one can easily understand the exam better. The Common Admission Test (CAT) is taken by over a quarter of a million students and is conducted by the Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs) on a rotational basis. The exam is considered one of the most competitive exams. The CAT Exam is a prerequisite for admissions in the IIMs and several other top management colleges in the country. To ace such a competitive exam, it is important to know the exam better and analyze the previous years papers properly. To help the candidates, a detailed CAT exam analysis for 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017,2018, 2019 & 2020 is given here.

CAT Exam Analysis of Previous years:

CAT 2014 Exam Analysis CAT 2015 Exam Analysis
CAT 2016 Exam Analysis CAT 2017 Exam Analysis
CAT 2018 Exam Analysis CAT 2019 Exam Analysis
CAT 2020 Exam Analysis CAT 2021 Exam Analysis

CAT aspirants are always suggested to check the previous year CAT exam analysis while preparing for the CAT exam. The detailed analysis of the CAT previous year papers are given above. CAT 2022 will be conducted in the last week of November 2022. Over the past few years, though the exam had some changes in the pattern, the question-types always remained the same. The changes over the past few years are given below.

Change in CAT Exam Pattern:

Year Conducting Institute Exam Duration Sections Exam Date(s)
CAT 2014 IIM Indore 170 Minutes 2 Sections:

1. Quantitative Ability

2. Data Interpretation

November 16 & November 22, 2014
CAT 2015 IIM Ahmedabad 180 minutes 3 Sections:

1. Quantitative Ability

2. Data Interpretation & Logical Reasoning

3. Verbal and Reading Comprehension

November 29, 2015
CAT 2016 IIM-Bangalore 180 minutes 3 Sections:

1. Quantitative Ability

2. Data Interpretation & Logical Reasoning

3. Verbal and Reading Comprehension

December 4, 2016
CAT 2017 IIM Ahmedabad 180 minutes 3 Sections:

1. Quantitative Ability

2. Data Interpretation & Logical Reasoning

3. Verbal and Reading Comprehension

November 26, 2017
CAT 2018 IIM Calcutta 180 minutes 3 Sections:

1. Quantitative Ability

2. Data Interpretation & Logical Reasoning

3. Verbal and Reading Comprehension

November 25, 2018
CAT 2019 IIM Kozhikode 180 minutes 3 Sections:

1. Quantitative Ability

2. Data Interpretation & Logical Reasoning

3. Verbal and Reading Comprehension

November 24, 2019
CAT 2020 IIM Indore 120 minutes 3 Sections:

1. Quantitative Ability

2. Data Interpretation & Logical Reasoning

3. Verbal and Reading Comprehension

November 29, 2020

CAT Exam Pattern Analysis (2015 to 2021)

The CAT exam pattern has changed thrice over the last few years and CAT 2020 was no different. Over the past few years, the CAT exam has undergone some changes with respect to the pattern and time duration. In CAT 2020, the QA sections included 26 questions, the DILR section included 24 questions and the VARC section included 26 questions. The question-type breakdown for CAT 2015, 2016,2017, 2018, 2019 & 2020 are mentioned below.

CAT Exam Pattern Analysis (2015 to 2017) Graph

Advantages of Checking CAT Exam Analysis:

There are various advantages of checking the analysis of the previous year CAT exam papers. Some of the advantages are given below:

  • Helps to Understand the Pattern

By checking the previous year paper analysis, one gets to know the actual pattern of the exam and gets acquainted with the change in pattern over the years. This can help to devise test-taking strategies.

  • Helps to Know the Difficulty Level

CAT paper analysis describes the difficulty of the individual sections in a detailed way. By checking the paper analysis, one gets to know from which sections and topics more difficult questions are asked.

  • Helps to Identify the Important Topics

Checking the previous year papers helps you in identifying which topics held more weightage and which topics are least included in the paper. This way, understanding the important topics becomes easy and one can prepare accordingly.

CAT aspirants can also check CAT previous year papers to get the past year question papers and prepare more effectively for the exam.

For complete assistance on CAT preparation, stay tuned with BYJU’S. Comment any CAT related queries below to get quick assistance.