CMA Pattern

The Institute of Cost Accountants of India (ICMAI) conducts the CMA exam twice a year in India. 

• June session: Held in the month of June.
• December session: Held in the month of December.

Candidates interested in appearing for the CMA exams can apply during the application window for the specific exam session they prefer.

The Certified Management Accountant (CMA) Examination is conducted in three courses namely Foundation, Intermediate and Final examination. The mode of all three courses is purely offline based. The candidates have to go to the centre in appear in the examination. To know more about the examination before to the official website or Shiksha.

CMA or Certified Management Accountant has been divided into three levels: Foundation, Intermediate, Final. If you are appearing for CMA foundation, you will have to appear for 4 exams in 2 shifts. Candidates who have cleared CMA foundation will be allowed to appear for CMA intermediate. CMA intermediate has 4 exams each in 2 shifts. You can choose to appear for 1 shift exam or both shift exams. Candidates who have cleared CMA intermediate and have training proof will be allowed to appear for CMA final. CMA final has 8 exams each in 2 shifts. It has 20 exams in total. You can join any coaching institute for better guidance.

No. There is no negative marking in the CMA exam, irrespective of the three course levels. Candidates can answer all questions without worrying about deduction of the marks. All questions in the CMA Foundation exam will fetch two marks each. While the questions in the CMA Intermediate and CMA Final course levels have different marks range. The maximum marks ranges from six marks to 15 marks per question. Candidates will not face any deduction of the marks, if the recorded answer is incorrect or the question is unattempted.

The type of questions in the CMA exam varies based on the course level. The space below mentions the course-wise type of questions in the CMA exam based on the course levels:

• CMA Foundation course exams have multiple choice questions. Candidates have to answer as many as 50 MCQs with four answer options. Out of the four options only one is correct.
• CMA Intermediate course exam has both objective types questions and descriptive type questions.
• Similar to the Intermediate level exam, questions in CMA Final course exams are both objective and discriptive. 

The passing score for all three levels of the CMA course levels is the same. Candidates securing a minimum of 40 per cent in all test papers and 50 per cent aggregate score pass the CMA exam. Candidates securing less marks even in one of the subjects will fail the entire group or course level for ICMAI CMA.

CMA foundation course has four papers. All four papers of CMA Foundation exam will have 50 multiple choice questions of two marks each.

CMA Intermediate course have two groups with four papers each. Each paper of CMA Intermediate has eight questions. Out of these questions, the first question is compulsory, while candidates have to attempt any five questions from the remaining seven questions. While some papers have five questions, first question is compulsory, and out of remaining four questions, three are mandatory.

Similarly, CMA Final course have different question numbers in different test papers.