CAT 2026 Answer Key: Check Response Sheet Release Date and Process to Download

CAT 2026 exam will be held on November 29, 2026. Official announcement of the exam and registration schedule will be announced in the last week of July 2026.

Yes, CAT 2026 exam will be conducted in three shifts. Exam timing of each slot will be:

• First shift: 8:00 AM to 10:00 AM
• Second shift: 12:00 PM to 2:00 PM and 
• Third shift: 4:00 PM to 6:00 PM

CAT 2026 may be conducted by IIM Indore. The institute had last conducted the exam in 2020, Since the top six IIMs   - BLACKI are given the responsibility to convene on rotation basis exam every five year, this year, it could be IIM Indore. Official announcement will be made most likely in May.

IIM CAP is a common selection process for newer Iims. Under the CAP candidates eligible for admission to the nine new Iims - IIM Bodhgaya, IIM Kashipur, IIM Sambalpur, IIM Sirmaur, IIM Jammu, IIM Ranchi, IIM Trichy and IIM Udaipur are shortlisted for What-PI round by a single IIM, the one who is given the responsibility to conduct the CAP round in a particular academic year. CAT cut offs, admission parameters and their weightage are same for all CAP Iims. The participating Iims send the list of candidates shortlisted by them for the What-PI process to the institute conducting CAP. The CAP conducting IIM conducts the What-PI round for all the participating Iims. The IIM CAP conducting institute then share the What-PI scores and results of the candidates with the participating institutes. Those institutes then prepare the final shortlist for admission. Those who are selected for admission are informed by the Iims via email. The offer of admission is sent to selected candidates which they have to accept within the given time limit. For more details of IIM CAP, read this article: https://www.shiksha.com/mba/articles/what-is-iim-cap-know-admission-process-selection-criteria-and-participating-institutes-blogId-51225.

CAT score is a national level test and is not accepted by B-Schools outside India. For pursuing MBA in foreign countries GMAT score is accepted. Indian B-Schools accept GMAT score for admitting foreign/NRI/PIO students.

CAT is also accepted for Executive MBA, PhD, FPM and other such management programmes in top colleges in India. Similarly, GMAT is also accepted for admission to domestic students in to Executive MBA and such programmes.

CAT exam score has the weightage of about 40-60 per cent in IIM shortlist. The weightage varies for each IIM but is in the range of 40-60 per cent. Rest of the weightage is divided between academics, gender and work experience. However, in the final shortlist, weightage of CAT score is less than that of WAT-PI. 

There is no pattern to which CAT question paper can be the toughest. The CAT question paper of every slot has unique questions. The examination body strives to maintain the same difficulty level of the paper across all slots but it may happen that a question can be more difficult from another. It is seen that, to keep the uniqueness of the question paper intact, the examination authority also changes the topic wise weightage a little bit across the exam slots. In most of the previous years, it is seen that the morning slot of the CAT exam is tougher than the rest two. However, candidates must not worry about the difficulty level of the slots as, the scores of all the candidates are normalised on a common scale to root out the possibility of advantage or disadvantage to any student due to difference in difficulty level. To know how the CAT scores are normalised, read this article: https://www.shiksha.com/mba/articles/understanding-cat-normalization-process-blogId-9386.

The preliminary answer key is the one released after the exam and the final answer is the one released after all the objections raised by candidates have been examined and accepted. The final CAT answer key is released along with the result. It is the final CAT answer key on the basis of which the CAT result is prepared. Which means, score of a candidate is based on the calculation of number of correct, incorrect and unanswered questions after all the objections have been examined. The preliminary CAT answer key is released with candidate's response sheet and there is option to challenge it. However, the final answer key is released only as question ID and correct answer option and there is no provision of challenging it. In CAT 2022, objection on two DILR questions raised by candidates was accepted and the question was dropped from final score calculation as it was found to be erroneous.

Maximum marks in CAT is 204. There are 68 questions each carrying 3 marks. VARC is of 72 marks and DILR and Quants are of 66 marks each.

CAT cutoffs are usually not announced with the CAT result. The CAT cutoffs are also not released to the public.

They are published after a few days of the result announcement when the IIMs and other colleges start their shortlisting process. The IIMs opens their shortlisting window based on the CAT cut-offs two to three days after the result announcement. The CAT percentile of candidates shortlisted for the Written Ability Test (WAT), Group Discussion (GD), and Personal Interview (PI) can be considered the cut-off for that IIM. For example, if a candidate with a CAT percentile of 99 belonging to the General category is selected for the WAT/GD-PI of IIM Calcutta, then the CAT cut-off for IIM Calcutta is 99 percentile. Only those candidates who make it to the WAT/GD-PI round of IIMs will get to know the cut-offs.

Qualifying CAT cut off percentiles of Iims for Written Ability Test (What) and Personal Interview PI are listed below. Candidates who MET the qualifying CAT cut off, were eligible for What-PI round. These qualifying CAT cut offs are for General Category. The cut offs for Reserved category students are lower:

1. IIM Ahmedabad: 95 percentile
2. IIM Bangalore: 85 percentile 
3. IIM Calcutta: 85 percentile
4. IIM Lucknow: 90 percentile
5. IIM Kozhikode: 85 percentile
6. IIM Indore: 90 percentile
7. IIM Udaipur: 93 percentile
8. IIM Shillong: 75 percentile
9. IIM Trichy: 93 percentile
10. IIM Visakhapatnam: 80 percentile
11. IIM Rohtak: 95 percentile
12. 1IIM Nagpur: 85 percentile
13. IIM Jammu: 93 percentile 
14. IIM Ranchi: 90 percentile
15. IIM Sirmaur: 92 percentile
16. IIM Bodhgaya: 93 percentile
17. IIM Sambalpur: 93 percentile
18. IIM Kashipur: 94 percentile 
19. IIM Raipur: 93 percentile
20. IIM Amritsar: 90 percentile

For complete details of IIM selection and admission process read this article: https://www.shiksha.com/mba/articles/iim-shortlist-selection-admission-criteria-blogId-18787.

CAT cut off is prepared by all accepting colleges individually. There is no one authorized body to do so. Even the IIMs determine their admission cut offs separately.

To get 99 percentile and above, candidates must attempt 40-45 out of 68 questions in CAT, with maximum accuracy.  

Yes, the CAT accepting MBA colleges conduct either GD/PI or WAT/PI. Since MBA is a professional course about business and team management, personality assessment round is essential to ensure that the aspirant has the flair for management which can be polished during the programme. Communication skills, problem solving ability, management and leadership are essential qualities for MBA thus, every B-School conducts GD/PI or WAT/PI.

No, the students who don't make it to the IIM shortlist of a particular year, they will not be considered for admission. Such candidates can appear for CAT again the next year and try for admission. If a candidate doesn't make it to the first shortlist, they can wait for the second shortlist to release in which they might be selected.