CEED Exam Date 2026 (Out): Check Complete M.Des Exam Schedule Here

IIT Bombay launched the exam portal for CEED 2026 on October 1, 2025.

The admission portal was activated along with the release of the admission notification. Candidates can access the admission portal at ceed.iitb.ac.in.

The admission portals include segments like important dates, examination information, program, download, and contact information. The candidate can check the key exam date in the important date section. 

 

IIT Bombay will release the qualifying cut-off for Part A in the first week of February 2026. Cut-off is released in the form of mean and standard deviation. 

The mean and standard deviation for Part-A (CEED 2025) are 45.48 and 16.98, respectively and for Part A (CEED 2024) were 41.90 and 16.72, respectively.

The qualifying cut-off is the minimum marks a candidate needs to score in the paper to get shortlisted. Part B answer booklets will only be evaluated if the candidate gets shortlisted.

So, if you don’t meet Part A cut-off marks, you will not get shortlisted and you Part B answer booklets will not be evaluated. Also, note that only shortlisted candidates will be assigned a merit rank in CEED 2026.

It is very much possible to prepare for CEED without coaching. If you prepare for the exam on your own, you need to be serious and plan the preparation smartly. After going through the syllabus, you must be able to decide the difficulty level, the time it will take to cover the syllabus, and revise. 

Remember, there are many instances of toppers who managed to ace the CEED exam without the aid of any coaching. Further, the outcome may not depend on whether you do coaching or not, but on the quality of your preparation.

A total of 5090 candidates registered for CEED 2025, out of which 4371 candidates appeared, and 1848 candidates qualified in the exam. 

Seats available for CEED admission vary from one institute to the other (that accept the exam scores for admission). For e. g, IIT Hyderabad has 30 seats, while IISc Bangalore has 18 seats. Candidates are informed that CEED is just a qualifying exam. Thus, any aspirant who clears CEED exam may have to appear in further admission rounds that may be conducted by the participating college. The application process at the participating colleges typically open once the CEED entrance exam results are announced.

The difficulty level of CEED exam has been maintained by authorities over the years. However, most design aspirants share that if difficulty level of all design entrance exams conducted for PG level courses is compared then CEED is slightly easier than NID Entrance Exam. This is primarily because the drawing questions asked in NID that are considered to be tougher than those put forth in CEED exam. Note that CEED exam is for admission to the M.Des courses offered by the eight participating colleges. Meanwhile, the NID that for the M.Des programme has three participating colleges.

The updated application fee that candidates have to pay an application fee when applying for the CEED exam is shown below.

Women candidates - INR 2000

SC, ST, PwD candidates - INR 2000

All other candidates - INR 4000

The candidate will have to pay a fee as per the category they belong. If the candidate selects the wrong category and pay the wrong feels, he or she may be disqualified. So, care must be taken when selecting ones category.

The CEED 2026 syllabus is vast. If you are not able to complete a chapter or topic, it is better to leave it and start another topic. Once you are done with the easier topics, you can come back and study the difficult ones. 

Candidates must report any issue faced by them while filling the CEED application form by clicking on the 'Report Problem' tab that is present on the right side of the application process windows. The tab is highlight in yellow colour. On clicking this tab, candidates had to elaborate on the problem that they are experiencing and also mention their registration number.

It was recommended that candidates fill out the form as soon as possible and don't wait for the last few days. It is because students could face server or other such issues which could delay or hinder the application process.

The CEED 2026 exam was held on Jan 18, 2026. So, aspiring candidates can start preparing for the exam.

1. Focus on the following resources to prepare for CEED:
2. Make sure that you get the best books to prepare the CEED.
3. If the study material is good, they will contain few to no errors, will cover the entire syllabus, contain practice problems, etc.
4. Solve sample and previous year’s question and sample papers
5. Take mock tests.
6. When studying make it a point to take notes. These notes will help you jot down all the important points.
7. Do timely revision.