A detailed CAT preparation strategy helps aspirants to get a step closer to securing high percentile in the exam. CAT is considered to be the most competitive MBA Entrance in the country. Almost 3 lakh aspirants took the CAT Entrance Exam in 2024, and the number of test-takers is assumed to increase in coming years. CAT 2025 preparation strategy is extremely crucial for the candidates to get the highest percentile. The exam has three sections. The first Section of the exam is the VARC (Verbal Ability and Reading Comprehension) Section, which tests the Verbal and Comprehension Abilities of the candidates.
The second section of the CAT Exam is the DILR (Data Interpretation And Logical Reasoning) Section. In this section, the candidates are tested for their ability to solve logical puzzles/caselets to derive the required output. The third and last section of the CAT Exam is the QA (Quantitative Aptitude) Section. The section tests the quantitative ability of the test-takers. In this article, we will share the CAT 2025 Preparation Strategy in a detailed manner.
CAT 2025: Important Dates
| Events | CAT Important Dates 2024 |
|---|---|
| CAT 2025 notification release | 30th July 2025 |
| CAT 2025 registration starts | 2nd August 2025 |
| CAT 2025 Registration ends | 13th September 2025 |
| CAT 2025 admit card | 25th October 2025 |
| CAT 2025 exam date | 26th November 2025 |
| Release of CAT 2025 Response Sheet & Question Paper | 2nd week of December 2025 |
| Last day to challenge answer key | Second week of December 2025 |
| CAT 2025 Result | Second week of January 2026 |
Also Read: Top 50 Best MBA Colleges in India
CAT 2025 – Preparation Strategy – Know the Eligibility
To be eligible for the CAT 2025 Exam, candidates must have a Bachelor’s Degree from any Indian university or an institution recognized by the Government of India. They must have scored at least 50% marks or an equivalent CGPA in their graduation. However, for candidates belonging to Scheduled Caste (SC), Scheduled Tribe(ST), and Persons with Disability (PwD) categories, a minimum of 45% marks or equivalent CGPA is required.
Candidates appearing for the final year of graduation or those who have completed the degree but are waiting for the university to declare the results can also apply. However, if such candidates are selected, the respective IIM will allow them to join the program provisionally only if they submit a certificate from the Vice-Chancellor/Registrar of their University/Institution. This certificate, issued on or before the date stipulated by the respective IIM, should state that the candidate has completed all the requirements for obtaining the Bachelor’s degree/equivalent qualification on the date of issuing the certificate.
It is important to note that meeting the minimum eligibility criteria alone does not guarantee admission to the IIMs or other participating institutes. Applicants must also meet the selection criteria set by the institutes, which may include factors such as academic performance in secondary and senior secondary school, work experience (if any) and most importantly, their performance in the CAT exam.
Also Read: IIM Selection Process and Admission Criteria
CAT 2025: Exam Pattern
The CAT Exam Pattern is revised annually by the organisation in charge of administering the exam. CAT is an Aptitude-Based Exam. As per the previous trends, the exam consists of 66 Questions. The exam contains 3 Sections, VAR C(Verbal Ability And Reading Comprehension), LRDI(Logical Reasoning And Data Interpretation) And QA(Quantitative Aptitude).
| Components | Details |
|---|---|
| Mode of Exam | Computer Based Test |
| Duration of Exam | 120 Minutes |
| CAT Exam Slots | The Exam is conducted in 3 Slots: Slot 1 – 8:30 AM to 10:30 AM Slot 2 – 12:30 PM to 2:30 PM Slot 3 – 4:30 PM to 6:30 PM |
| Number of Questions | 68 |
| CAT Total Marks | 204 |
| Language of question paper | English |
| Number of answer choices | 4 |
| Question Type | MCQs And TITA Questions |
| Mark awarded for Each Correct Answer | +3 Marks |
| Mark Deducted for Every Wrong Answer | -1 Marks |
- CAT VARC Section Pattern: The VARC Section in the CAT consists of 24 questions, out of which 16 questions are based on Reading Comprehension from diverse genres and 8 questions are based on Verbal Ability. 4 out of 24 questions are TITA-Type Questions(There is no negative marking for TITA Questions).
- CAT LRDI Section Pattern: The LRDI Section in the CAT consists of 22 questions, the exam gives these questions in the form of sets. In CAT’23 there were 4 Sets containing 5 Questions each. One can expect 4 TITA questions distributed among the four sets.
- CAT QA Section Pattern: The Quantitative Aptitude Section in the CAT consists of 22 Questions, based on mixed concepts of basic mathematics.
Mistakes to Avoid During CAT 2025 Preparation
As the CAT Exam doesn’t have any predefined syllabus, it becomes a highly unpredictable exam. Hence it is advised that candidates should be cautious about not making the following mistakes in their Preparation.
- Not Starting Early is one of the most common mistakes made by a lot of students every year. This eventually results in a panic situation when the exam gets closer.
- Not Understanding the Basic Requirements of an Exam is another common mistake made by CAT aspirants. One should have enough knowledge about the exam pattern and the type of questions that one can face in the examination.
- Not Strategizing Your Preparation is another mistake one should avoid. When aiming for an exam like CAT, one should go for a well-structured preparation that assigns time Evenly to each section.
- Not Doing Frequent Revisions can waste one’s efforts. Being an aptitude-based exam, one should never get out of touch with important CAT topics. It is advised to follow a weekly revision routine.
- Not Taking and Analysing Mock Tests is another common mistake made by thousands of CAT aspirants every year. Taking and analyzing mocks is one of the most important elements in CAT preparation. One should take as many mocks as possible.
- Skipping Topics / Not Completing the Syllabus is one of the most common mistakes to avoid.
Also Read: Mistakes to Avoid During your CAT Preparation
CAT 2025 Overall Preparation Strategy
Start as early as possible.
In the year 2023, a total of 3.28 lakh candidates registered for the CAT exam. Keeping this in mind, we can assume that these numbers are only going to increase in future. Hence in order to have an edge over other test takers, one should start as early as possible. From this point in time, one has almost 1.5 years to prepare, which is an abundant amount of time for CAT 2025 Preparation.
Get familiar with the exam.
Getting familiar with the CAT Exam should be the first step for students aiming to crack CAT 2025. Being an aptitude-based exam, the CAT becomes hard to predict. Hence it is important to go through the Past year’s papers to get an idea about Exam Pattern. After going through the exam pattern and syllabus, one may have an idea about their strong and weak sections, and then they can plan their preparation accordingly.
Take Assistance if you are Clueless.
Many first-time CAT takers are often clueless when it comes to planning a well-structured Preparation strategy. In such cases, one may consider joining iQuanta’s CAT 2025 Course, as students here are provided with high-quality Content (updated as per the latest Standards), and get access to their vast CAT Preparation community where aspirants can get guidance from Mentors who are themselves studying in Top B-schools of the nation.
Be Consistent throughout.
It is observed that the Candidates start their preparation with great enthusiasm, but as months pass the preparation starts getting boring for them and they start losing their Motivation. This eventually results in inconsistency. Hence if one is planning for long-term preparation, then one must take assistance from CAT 2025 Coaching, to stay motivated and connected to other CAT aspirants. Engaging in the Community would keep you connected to your fellow aspirants, which may act as a constant source of inspiration.
Practice!
It has been observed that every year many CAT aspirants end up wasting months in covering the CAT Syllabus, and still are not able to score well in the CAT Exam. The reason is lack of practice. Practising relevant content makes one efficient in solving CAT-level questions. When you practice regularly, you solve questions from different topics which also acts as revision for the topics you have already covered. Hence it is advised to serious aspirants to enrol in CAT 2025 Coaching which provides abundant practice questions without compromising the quality, like iQuanta’s CAT Books which are updated as per the recent exam standard and is a new addition to the CAT 2025 Course.
Take Plenty of Mocks and Analyse them well.
Taking Mocks allows you to practice in a time-bound manner which helps you to keep track of your Preparation. Mocks make one habitual to the exam-like scenarios and also make one aware of their weak and strong areas so that they can be worked upon accordingly. To help CAT Aspirants track their mistakes and efficiently analyse their mocks, iQuanta has included the iCAT Mock test series in their CAT 2025 Course, which is an AI-enabled mock series loaded with features that make test-taking experience interesting for Aspirants.
Also Read: How to Start Preparing For CAT
CAT 2025 Preparation Strategy for VARC:
Assuming that the duration of CAT 2025 will be 2 hours, and hence there will be 16 questions on RC, which is 70% of the total VARC questions. This is a section that checks your comprehension the most, and not the vocabulary or the grammar abilities. One can plan their preparation for the CAT’s VARC Section in alignment with the following steps:
Start Reading.
Most of the CAT Aspirants don’t have English as their native language, due to which they often struggle to Comprehend the RC passages given in the VARC Section of the CAT Exam. Reading regularly would serve as the best solution for every aspirant who faces issues in the CAT’s VARC Section. It helps in enhancing one’s vocabulary and also improves one’s understanding of language, which results in improved comprehension abilities. In parallel to the CAT 2025 Course, students would also have access to 250 Genre-wise reading articles, which would serve as a great source for reading.
Develop grammar Abilities and vocabulary.
In the CAT Exam, we are not asked direct questions on grammatical abilities and vocabulary, though developing grammar and vocabulary can help one in enhancing his/her Comprehension skills. Hence if one is starting early, then he/she must not skip working on his/her vocabulary and grammatical skills.
Start solving 1RC or 2VA questions.
After spending a few months in reading and developing vocab and grammatical skills, one can start Solving Reading Comprehension sets and Verbal Ability Questions. Initially one can start with 1RC a day, and then can further increase the number of questions.
Start taking Sectionals:
After enough practice, you can start taking sectionals. Taking sectional mocks allows you to practice the particular section in a time-based manner. The sectional test allows one to focus on an individual section at a time, which can help one to identify their strength and weaknesses and can improve time management skills in an individual. In VARC you can experiment with different approaches to the section, to know what works for you.
Taking and Analysing Mocks:
Mock Tests are one of the most important aspects of CAT Preparation. Through mocks one gains test-taking experience, which makes one habitual of exam pattern. Mocks are designed to help aspirants build concepts, prepare strategies, identify weaknesses, and take steps to eliminate them. Though just taking mocks is not enough, one should analyze mocks so that they can understand their level of preparation, and can also reflect on their weak areas. After analyzing mocks, it is also important to strategize further preparation accordingly.
Special Addition:
iQuanta Engineer’s VARC is the ultimate solution for students who are weak in English. Module Includes Genre-wise RC videos and Detailed VA videos with solutions. This module has been added to the CAT 2025 Course and its key focus is to develop comprehension abilities in students. It consists of videos on understanding tone, assumption & inferences.
Also Read: How to Prepare for CAT VARC
CAT Preparation Strategy 2025 for LRDI:
All you need for cracking LRDI is familiarity with the CAT Type LRDI Sets. This means if you have solved 600-1000 CAT Type LRDI sets before your CAT Exam you will be able to solve at least 50% of the sets in the CAT Exam. From this point, one can plan their preparation strategy in accordance with the following steps:
Start with games like sudoku, and kakuro.
Before diving straight into CAT Level LRDI sets one should focus on developing basic logical abilities. Mind games like Sudoku and Kakuro involve logic, problem-solving and spotting patterns. These games help aspirants develop logical abilities, which trains them in spotting patterns and initiating the solution of any puzzle-based LRDI Set. This step will give you a slow but good start.
Start Developing Basic Concepts.
In this phase, you can go through the assumed syllabus of CAT’s LRDI Section. One can make a list of topics mentioned in the syllabus, try to understand the basic concepts of each topic and start solving with basic sets of the given topics. In the real exam, one can never expect a set straight out of some topic, but a set that involves a mixture of two or more topics. Still in the Initial phase, one should solve topic-wise sets, as this process will help you in building strong basics.
Start solving PYQ of years 2000 to 2014.
Now that one has an idea of the syllabus and a clear understanding of the topics, one should start solving the Previous year’s questions from the year 2000 to 2014 and try to understand the type of Sets asked in the CAT Exam. It is observed that the level of LRDI sets has increased from the year 2015. Hence PYQs from the year 2000 to 2014, should be practised before Starting CAT-level LRDI Sets. You can solve Past CAT Papers here: https://www.iquanta.in/test/cat-previous-papers and at the later stage it will be complemented by CAT Level LRDI Sets in Mocks, sectionals or iQuanta Course.
Practice!
Practice CAT Level LRDI Sets. Practising more and more CAT-Level sets is the only way to improve in this section. When you are 9 months away from the CAT Exam you should target to solve at least 4 LRDI sets daily. The IIM ABC Batch offered by iQuanta would be the best material to refer to if one is looking for CAT-level practice sets.
Start Taking Sectionals.
After enough practice, you can start taking sectionals. Taking sectional mocks allows you to practice the particular section in a time-based manner. The sectional test allows one to focus on an individual section at a time, which can help one to identify their strength and weaknesses and can improve time management skills in an individual. In LRDI, identifying the right set to start with has always been a challenge for aspirants. Through sectional one can develop the skill of choosing the right set, to implement in mocks and finally in the real exam.
Start Taking and Analysing Mocks.
Mock Tests are one of the most important aspects of CAT Preparation. Through mocks one gains test-taking experience, which makes one habitual of exam pattern. Mocks are designed to help aspirants build concepts, prepare strategies, identify weaknesses, and take steps to eliminate them. Though just taking mocks is not enough, one should analyze mocks so that they can understand their level of preparation, and can also reflect on their weak areas. After analyzing mocks, it is also important to strategize further preparation accordingly.
Additional Material:
Besides the CAT 2025 Coaching, iQuanta also provides free CAT Material which helps thousands of CAT aspirants every year. The LRDI Master playlist on iQuanta’s CAT Youtube channel can serve as a great source for practice in the LRDI Section of the CAT Exam.
Also Read: DILR For CAT
CAT 2025 Preparation Strategy for QA:
Develop basic Concepts.
To prepare for CAT’s Quantitative Aptitude, building your fundamental concepts should be one’s primary step. It is suggested to take lectures to develop the fundamentals of mathematical concepts that will be asked in the CAT Exam.
Practice! Practice! Practice!
Once you know the basic concept, you should jump into practising. Quantitative Aptitude is considered a section that can be improved if one practices with consistency and dedication.
Revision.
Revision of your basics regularly would help you to keep everything you learnt collected till the exam.
Start Taking Sectionals.
After enough practice, you can start taking sectionals. Taking sectional mocks allows you to practice the particular section in a time-based manner. The sectional test allows one to focus on an individual section at a time, which can help one to identify their strength and weaknesses and can improve time management skills in an individual. In Quantitative Aptitude, we have 22 Questions of mixed difficulty levels. To score well in the real exam one needs to develop the practice of selecting and solving easier questions first, and then move to questions with moderate or high difficulty.
Taking and Analysing Mocks.
Mock Tests are one of the most important aspects of CAT Preparation. Through mocks one gains test-taking experience, which makes one habitual of exam pattern. Mocks are designed to help aspirants build concepts, prepare strategies, identify weaknesses, and take steps to eliminate them. Though just taking mocks is not enough, one should analyze mocks so that they can understand their level of preparation, and can also reflect on their weak areas. After analyzing mocks, it is also important to strategize further preparation accordingly.
Special Addition:
The Non-Engineer’s Quant Module has been designed for aspirants who need to refresh their basic math concepts. This module bridges conceptual gaps for non-engineering students, considering the difficulty level of the CAT 2023 Quants section. This is something we don’t usually find in CAT 2025 Coaching. Module Contains conceptual videos covering the mathematical concepts taught between standard 6th to 10th in school.
Also Read: How to Prepare Quantitative Aptitude For CAT
Free and Paid Resources For the CAT 2025 Preparation
Choosing the best CAT study material for CAT preparation is very important. iQuanta offers plenty of free and Paid resources to CAT Aspirants.
Reading resources for VARC
Reading is the most important aspect when it comes to the CAT VARC Section. There are abundant resources available on the internet through which one can develop their Reading habits. But there is a lack of proper genre-wise reading articles available in one place. To help CAT aspirants, iQuanta has come up with a comprehensive 250 Genre-wise reading articles with their summary. One can improve their Comprehension abilities through Reading from these resources.
Practice questions
Once you are done with concept clearance, you should jump on to the practising part. Practising highly relevant questions and learning the right concepts is the key to success in the CAT exam. Strengthening your basics through conceptual learning, moving on to advanced-level questions gradually after solving the basics and taking mocks is the right order for CAT preparation. iQuanta here is providing you with the right CAT study material for free. Initially, one can start practising basic questions and can later move to more complex ones. The iConcept-material by iQuanta can serve as a good resource for basic CAT Preparation.
As the concept-building material can only help you to a certain level, hence iQuanta has come up with comprehensive CAT Preparation Books for the benefit of all CAT aspirants. Unlike the usual preparation materials, these books are Updated as per the recent trends of the exam.
CAT Past Year Papers
When it comes to efficient CAT preparation, practising past year papers is a vital component. Solving past year’s papers will help you understand the CAT exam pattern and what kind of questions are asked in the exam. iQuanta provides you with the past 23 years of CAT papers in test format along with solutions.
How iQuanta Prepare you for CAT Exam 2025?
iQuanta is known for its expertise in the CAT Exam. Over the past five years, iQuanta has secured 25,000+ IIM calls and converted thousands of aspirants into IIM students. In CAT 2023, iQuanta shattered all records with over 200 99+ percentilers and 750 95+ percentilers. Features like Dual pedagogy, 24/7 Doubt-solving support, Updated Content and AI-Enabled mocks sets us apart from other traditional coaching. The CAT 2025 Course has a few special additions as well, particularly Non-Engineers Quant Conceptual Videos and Engineer’s VARC Module which are designed to help students who are weak in Quants and VARC respectively.
The CAT 2025 Course will start in the month of July, here we have discussed the course timeline:
- July’24 to Dec’24
– In this duration, we mainly focus on developing basics. (Friday, Saturday class)
– There will be weekly 2 live lectures, specifically on Friday and Saturday (7 pm-9 pm)
– After completion of any Topic, there will 3hr Session for Revision
– After completion of the Topic, Students will get Assignments on their Dashboards.
– One would go from basics to moderate level. - Jan’25 to May’25
– From Jan the frequency of lectures will be increased to 3 Live Lectures and 6 Live Application Classes in a week.
– Practice Sessions with be conducted. - June’25 to Sep’25
– In June the Mock Season Starts, in this phase you will be given access to 35 Full-length mocks and 45 Sectionals.
– Practice Sessions will be conducted. - Sep’25 to Nov’25
– Students enrolled for the CAT 2025 Course will be given free access to the Crash course.
