CEED Preparation Tips 2026: Section-wise Strategy, Topper Tips, Best Books, Study Material

The CEED 2026 exam will be 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. 

It is very much possible to prepare for CEED without coaching. But before you embark on exam preparation on your own, you need the conviction that you can do it. If you are not convinced yourself and only decide to forgo coaching on the advice of others, the journey may be difficult.

If you prepare for the exam on your own, you need to be serious and plan the preparation smartly. For instance, after going through the syllabus, you must be able to decide the difficulty level, time it will take to cover the syllabus, and do revision. 

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

Some of the important topics to prepare for CEED 2026 include:

• Design Concepts
• Product Designing
• Logical Reasoning
• Colour Theory, Color Schemes and color Compositions
• Scale and Proportion
• Poster, Logo, Character designing
• Basics of Drawing - Lines and Shapes
• Anatomy, Proportions and Divisions
• Sketching
• How to Develop Characters
• Basic and advanced Human Drawings
• Story Illustrations

These topics are important because they either carry more weighatge or have a greeter chance of being asked in the entrance exam.

To improve your English language skills, you should develop a habit of reading English newspapers daily.

Apart from this, you can also practice grammar by attempting past year question papers and mock tests. There are many good books in the market to polish your English comprehension skills. Word Power Made Easy is one example.

Check out the list of recommended books for the English language and start working. Note that it is not enough to just read the book with your eyes, you need to bring out your pen and paper and do sufficient practice. Also, when reading, make it a habit to read out loud. It will improve your pronunciation and give you a better grip on vocabulary.

The sketching part of CEED will include stages like - representation, in the form of geometric figures like lines, squares, and triangles, outline drawing, detailing, and shading. If you are a beginner, focus more on outline drawing, representation, and the easier aspects, rather than focusing on detailing and shading. As you become more adept, you can start adding nuances to your drawing. When making a sketch, focus on the following points:

• Shape of the figure
• Proportion
• Line quality

You can start solving sample papers for CEED very early on in your exam preparation. For instance, you can do the exercise after completing a chapter. All you have to do is find the relevant questions in the sample papers and start solving. As you move on in your CEED 2026 exam preparation, you the sample papers will be more useful. In fact, as you complete the syllabus, you can attempt the complete sample paper.

By solving the sample papers you can improve your problem-solving and time-management skills. Also, you can solve sample papers right up to the exam-day. 

If you start solving sample papers late in your exam preparation, you must be able to solve around 10-12 sample papers. However, if you start solving sample papers early on, it is not exactly the quantity that you are focusing on.

For instance, if you complete a chapter and solve all the relevant problems givn in the sample paper, it will also be very effective. And you can repeat this model for other topics as well. The only difference here is you are not solving the entire sample paper in one go in this case. Rather attacking it one chapter or topic at a time.

And once you complete the entire syllabus, you can then attempt the complete sample paper.

IIT Bombay is exam conducting body for CEED 2026. The institute, however, doesn’t prescribed any study material for the exam. 

So, in a bid to help the candidate, we bring you a list of recommended books for CEED 2026 after consulting previous years’ CEED question papers. The names suggested by toppers and experts have also been taken into account when compiling this list.

While text books should be the primary resource for CEED exam preparation, there are other resources the candidate may use effectively. For instance, YouTube has many educational and preparation videos that the candidate can refer to.

To identify the quality and genuineness (or correctness) of the data, you can go through the video reviews. In some cases, the review section may be hidden. In that case, you better stay away, as it is difficult to determine the quality of the content.

Also, refer to instructors or educators with a large number of followers or subscribers.

The natural instict in such a case will be to give a few more attempts. You can also try a few attempts. But after that move on to the next topic. Also, don’t spend prodigious time on one simple topic, because otherwise you will run out of time and will not be able to complete the entire syllabus.

If you leave out a few difficult topics now, you can always tackle them later on if you have time left.

Further, completing the entire syllabus may be a daunting task for many. 

You can start preparing for CEED exam by following the below steps:

• Understand CEED exam pattern and syllabus well.
• Note that the CEED syllabus has been revised for both Part A and Part B.
• IIT Bombay will release the detailed exam pattern when it releases the information brochure, sometime in September.
• Make a well thought-out timetable for CEED preparation
• Practice as many CEED previous year question papers and sample papers as possible
• Take notes when you are studying.
• Analyse your weak areas for the exam and work to improve those areas/subjects
• Take mock tests.

Candidates have the option to enroll in a coaching center to prepare for CEED. But by no means is coaching is a sure-shot route for success. In fact, it is far from it. If you pick up any statistics, only a very small percentage of students who get enrolled in a coaching institute manage to crack CEED. The reason being, a coaching class is attended by a large number of students. Now the coaching centre won’t be able to or may not pay attention to the needs of each student individually. The result being most of the students are left to fend for themselves. This means, if your fundamentals are not strong or you manage to be in the radar of the coaching management, you might not get the extra support that you require.

Since CEED is a general aptitude test, you can benefit greatly by practicing previous year question papers. Also, after practicing the papers, it is highly important to analyse your strong and weak areas for the exam and then work on them accordingly. 

But that being said, you can’t prepare for the CEED only on the strength of solving the sample papers. You need to read the text books to learn the concepts, understand the various dynamic. Note that unless your theoretical knowledge is sound, you won’t be able to feel truly confident. 

Some experts suggest that you skip your GA preparation for now. Instead, you can start preparing for the section 45 days or so before the exam. The logic is, GA is more about theory than anything else. So, even if you must the subject now, you will have to do thorough revision closer to the exam to remember all the points. 

Also, you need not bother about the interview now. That part will be important only after the results are declared. 

The CEED 2026 exam is expected to be conducted in the second week of January 2026. So, the candidate has plenty of time to prepare for the exam. Given the CEED 2026 syllabus is of moderate to difficult, you would ideally need 6 months or so to prepare for the exam. 

That being said, if your fundamentals are strong, you can cover the syllabus in less time. Before starting you preparation, go through the syllabus and pattern, and draft a plan. Once the plan is ready, get going with full guns blazing.

Note that to fully prepare for the exam, you need to solve sample papers and take mock tests.

The CEED 2026 applications are open now, from October 1, 2025. The application has to be filled online at ceed.iitb.ac.in.

The candidate can apply with both regular and late fees.

All the details pertaining to the CEED 2026 application form have been updated on the admission portals, including the information brochure. The candidate needs to carefully go through the brochure to check their eligibility. Note that information entered by the candidate at the time of submitting their application form will be verified at the time of counseling. Any candidate who doesn’t meet the criteria will be disqualified.

IIT Bombay will conduct the CEED 2026 exam on January 18, 2026 (9 am - 12 noon).

The exam will include two sections - Part A and Part B. Part A of the exam will be administered in a computer-based mode, whereas Part B will be held offline. It is mandatory for candidates to qualify for Part A. 

If the candidate fails to qualify for Part A, his or her Part B answers booklet will not be evaluated. 

The final score cum merit list of CEED 2026 will be calculated by giving weightage to both Part A and Part B.