GATE Counselling

Candidates need to meet minimum qualifying mark to participate in GATE 2026 CCMT counselling. The CGPA is different for each category. For General/EWS and OBC-NCL category, the required CGPA is 6.5 on a 10-point scale, which is 60%. On the other hand, for SC/ST and PwD, required CGPA is 6.0 on a 10-point scale, which is 55%.

Yes, candidates with GATE score of 400 to 500 are also eligible for COAP counselling. However, admission and selection chances completely depends on different criteria such as branch selection, competition level, category, etc. 

Candidates with a valid GATE scorecard of 2026/2025/2024 are eligible to participate in COAP counselling 2026

Yes, it is mandatory to register at COAP. To apply, candidates need to check their eligibility and register at respective IITs and COAP portal. The counselling will be held in rounds. Candidates will have to perform choice filling, locking, document  verification process, etc. 

COAP also called as Common Offer Acceptance Portal is a platform used for GATE qualified candidates to exercise their college acceptance choices for admission to MTech/Ph/ME programmes. The COAP is a counselling platform used by participating IITs, IISc, and PSU for job recruitments.

It is one platform to perform all counselling activities starting from candidate registration to choice filling, locking, seat allotment and reporting to the allotted institute.

The scorecard of GATE is valid for 3 years. However, many PSUs often restrict of using old GATE scorecard. Many PSUs accept GATE scorecard of current year or at least one year old result scorecard.

Many new NITs do accept 500 score in GATE for M.Tech admission. Here are some NITs that accept GATE scores between 400 - 500 -

• National Institute of Technology, Tiruchirappalli

• Visvesvaraya National Institute of Technology, Nagpur

• National Institute of Technology, Silchar

• National Institute of Technology, Warangal

• NIT Mizoram

• NIT Raipur

• NIT Agartala

• NIT Arunachal Pradesh

Securing 2500 rank in GATE is considered good. With this rank, you can get admission to new IITs, top NITs and IIITs as well. However, opportunities for PSU jobs can be limited.  GATE AIR of 2500 can roughly correspond a GATE score of 670 to 750. 

• Possible NITs include - NIT Trichy, NIT Suratkal, NIT Calicut
• New IITs - IIT Bhilai, IIT Patna, IIT Mandi, etc. 

Based on previous year's cutoff trends and experts analysis, here is an expected GATE score range required for M.Tech admission -

The GATE scorecard on 2026 will be valid till 2029. With the help of GATE result scorecard, qualified candidates can apply for M.Tech and PhD at IITs, IISc, NITs, and other engineering colleges in India. With valid GATE scorecard, applicants can also apply for PSU recruitments, such as NTPC, GAIL, AAI, BHEL, etc.