IIM Bangalore PG, Doctorate, Certificate Courses 2025

IIM Bangalore considers two kinds of CAT scores for MBA admission - Qualifying and Final score. Qualifying CAT score is the minimum sectional and overall CAT score used to shortlist students for the Analytical Writing Test (AWT) and Personal Interview (PI) rounds. Candidates above minimum cutoffs in the sectional percentile ranks, the overall percentile rank and having a positive (greater than zero) raw score in all sections of CAT are considered for the next stage. The final CAT score is cutoffs are the basis of which the candidates are called for final selection after the AWT and PI rounds are over. 

The answer to this question of whether an average student can get into IIM can be both yes and no depending on the definition of an average student.

• Based on Academics (Class 10/ Class 12/ Graduation): While a student with average scores in Class 10, Class 12 and graduation with a good CAT score certainly has good chances of getting a call from IIM-A, chances are less for someone with an average CAT score.
• Based on student category (General or Reserved): While it is tough for a General category average student to grab a seat at IIM due to high score requirements, a reserved category student can get admission being at average scores as well.
• Based on past work experience, diversity and other factors: Gender and academic diversity is also a factor on which students are shortlisted at IIM. IIMs judge the past academic category based on the degree obtained by the students before MBA and then a weightage is allotted based on that. For Engineers, the percentage for scoring the highest marks is higher as compared with other streams
• Performance in selection rounds: Once you make it to the final selection rounds, i.e., AWT/PI process, it can be considered a fresh start. At this stage, students can forget their past average-ness but definitely require good grasp over the past subjects as academics-related questions are asked in the interview.

Based on the above factors, it can be considered that while getting into top Management institutes, such as IIM is extremely tough, the past performance, CAT performance, student category and a lot of factors can be the reasons for a student to receive that final call.

It is not possible to join IIM Bangalore directly after Class 12 since the institute mostly offers postgraduate and doctoral level programmes in the field of Management. However, a student who has completed his/ her Class 12 can complete the final graduation and then look out for admission to IIM-B. 

The institute offers MBA, Executive MBA, and other courses at PG, doctoral and certificate level courses in the field of Management. Interested applicants are required to go through the national-level entrances and then appear for the institute-level selection rounds for final admission. Admission to the flagship course, i.e. MBA of IIM Bangalore is based on a valid score in the CAT exam, followed by a Personal Interview (PI) and Written Ability Test (WAT) round. IIM Bangalore offers admission to Indian students via CAT and international students via GMAT/ GRE. IIM Bangalore conducts IIM-B tests for admission to Executive MBA (EPGP) and PhD courses.