VARC syllabus for CAT 2025: Important Tips and Study Material
Common Admission Test 2025 ( CAT )
Admit Card - 5 Nov '25 - 30 Nov '25
Verbal Ability and Reading Comprehension (VARC) section of CAT exam comprises 24 questions. Candidates need to attempt it in 40 minutes. Read here to know which topics to focus in VARC syllabus for CAT and which are the best books for it.
CAT 2025 will be conducted on November 30, 2025, which means candidates have just about 5 months to prepare for the exam. Most students find either Quant or Reasoning tough and spend most of their CAT preparation time on these and VARC section get neglected. Now as we all know CAT is divided into three sections and it is extremely important to score well in all the sections to get a good overall percentile. It will be suicidal to not pay equal attention on the VARC section. More importantly because CAT VARC preparation requires more time in reading. It has the maximum weightage in CAT exam. To guide candidates in preparation of VARC, Shiksha brings to you some key insights.
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Verbal Ability and Reading Comprehension (VARC) section will be the first section in CAT 2025 exam having 24 questions. Candidates need to attempt it in 40 minutes.
Ideally, candidates should finish CAT VARC syllabus by August end and focus on mocks in the month of November. One needs to create a solid preparation plan as soon as possible and stick to it. Create this plan keeping in mind your strengths and weakness in VARC. Spend at least three hours a day for CAT preparation. That’ll give you about 350 hours before CAT 2025 exam day. Out of 350 hours, keep about 100 hours in practicing Mock Tests.
VARC syllabus for CAT can be broadly classified into four sub-categories:
- Grammar
- Vocabulary
- Verbal Reasoning
- Reading Comprehension
- VARC Syllabus for CAT: Weightage and Difficulty Level
- Best Books for CAT VARC Preparation
- CAT Preparation 2025: Tips for VARC
- CAT VARC Study Material: Sample Test Papers for Practice
VARC Syllabus for CAT: Weightage and Difficulty Level
Since there are no direct Grammar and Vocabulary questions in CAT, the candidate needs to focus on application of their knowledge of the language. The table below idicates types of questions asked in CAT VARC and number of questions asked from each. This knowledge will help you in making a VARC study plan with focus on scoring well.
| VARC Topics for CAT |
No. of Questions in CAT Exam |
Level of Difficulty |
|---|---|---|
| Reading Comprehension |
16 |
Moderate to Difficult |
| VA-Parajumbles |
3 |
Moderate to Difficult |
| VA-Odd Sentence |
2 |
Easy to Moderate |
| VA-Summary |
3 |
Easy to Moderate |
| Overall |
24 |
Moderate to Difficult |
Best Books for CAT VARC Preparation
Some of the most recommended CAT books for VARC section are mentioned below:
- How To Prepare For Verbal Ability And Reading Comprehension For CAT by Arun Sharma, Meenashi Upadhyay
- The Pearson Guide to Verbal Ability for the CAT and Other MBA Entrance Examinations by Sujit Kumar
- The Pearson Guide to Verbal Ability and Logical Reasoning for the CAT by Nishit K Sinha
- High School Grammar and Composition Wren and Martin
- Word Power Made Easy by Norman Lewis
Also Read: CAT Books - Section wise best books for CAT and secondary reading
CAT Preparation 2025: Tips for VARC
Here are key tips to study VARC syllabus for CAT. The exam will be held on November 30, 2025, so start studying now.
Grammar:
CAT exam generally tests the basic high school level grammar of students. One needs to identify and correct grammatical errors swiftly.
Some of the common concepts that candidates need to prepare are use of subject-verb agreement, articles, prepositions, modifiers, parallel construction, phrasal verbs and redundancy and so on. Candidates may get questions on identifying mistakes in a sentences or sequence of sentence.
Vocabulary:
This part tests a candidate's knowledge of language and lexicon. There can be simple sentence completion (fill-in-the-blanks) or correct/incorrect use of words in a sentence. This section cannot be developed/practiced overnight. Candidates need to develop a regular study habit to score well in this section.
Verbal Reasoning:
Questions related to paragraph formation and paragraph completion are integral in this section of verbal ability. Candidates will have to identify sentence that stands out in a paragraph or deduce summary, or identify the statement that fits the best summary or organise a given set of questions based on the given passage. Deducing such questions is direct application of logic/reasoning. Regular practice will help build proficiency in this area.
Reading Comprehension:
Like vocabulary, RCs can be mastered with regular practice and attempting mocks. One should start reading editorial columns of leading newspapers or good online news and opinion websites. Read at least one dense passage every day and try to summarise it. Do not limit yourself to reading on a particular subject. Read from a diverse set of topics: Politics, science, economics, psychology, environment and so on.
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CAT VARC Study Material: Sample Test Papers for Practice
Get below free PDFs of VARC sample questions for practice with solution.
| CAT Easy Test Set 1 | CAT Easy Test Set 1 Solutions |
| CAT Medium Test Set 1 | CAT Medium Test Set 1 Solutions |
| CAT Difficult Test Set 1 | CAT Difficult Test Set 1 Solutions |
| CAT Easy Test Set 2 | CAT Easy Test Set 2 Solutions |
| CAT Medium Test Set 2 | CAT Medium Test Set 2 Solutions |
| CAT Difficult Test Set 2 | CAT Difficult Test Set 2 Solutions |
| CAT Easy Test Set 3 | CAT Easy Test Set 3 Solutions |
| CAT Medium Test Set 3 | CAT Medium Test Set 3 Solutions |
| CAT Difficult Test Set 3 | CAT Difficult Test Set 3 Solutions |
| CAT Easy Test Set 4 | CAT Easy Test Set 4 Solutions |
| CAT Medium Test Set 4 | CAT Medium Test Set 4 Solutions |
| CAT Difficult Test Set 4 | CAT Difficult Test Set 4 Solutions |
| CAT Easy Test Set 5 | CAT Easy Test Set 5 Solutions |
| CAT Medium Test Set 5 | CAT Medium Test Set 5 Solutions |
| CAT Difficult Test Set 5 | CAT Difficult Test Set 5 Solutions |
| CAT Easy Test Set 6 | CAT Easy Test Set 6 Solutions |
| CAT Medium Test Set 6 | CAT Medium Test Set 6 Solutions |
| CAT Difficult Test Set 6 | CAT Difficult Test Set 6 Solutions |
Download Free VARC Question Bank for Practice |
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