Navigating the CAT 2023 Storm – Check Target Scores Required to Meet IIM Sectional Cut Offs in Quantitative Section – MBAUniverse.com Exclusive

The storm that CAT 2023 exam created on November 26, 2023 with its high difficulty level especially in Quantitative Ability section is not ready to subside. After MBAUniverse.com published a story highlighting that even Arun Sharma, 100 percentile and Author of best-selling book on Quantitative Aptitude for CAT, found the Quant section ‘very tough’, candidates have taken to social media to express their disappointment. Many candidates said that they are worried if they will be able to clear the Quantitative Sectional cut offs to get IIM Calls. To clear the air, MBAUniverse.com decided to review the very latest IIM Admission Criteria 2024, and sought opinions from leading CAT experts. Our research revealed some very interesting insights. 

What is the Minimum Quant Section Cut Offs for IIMs?
IIMs have recently announced their admission policy 2024 with latest sectional cut offs. MBAUniverse.com checked for the latest data for sectional cut off for QA section for top IIMs. Only those CAT 2023 test takers who clear the minimum cut offs will qualify to be considered for shortlisting provided they also meet the cut off for other sections and overall cut offs.

Here are the Cut Off Requirements for IIMs that you need to clear QA section. As evident from table 1, the minimum cut off for IIM A for QA section is 70! Many other IIMs including IIMC and IIMK have 75% are cut off requirement. Check table 1 below.  

Table 1: Minimum Sectional Cut Offs for Quantitative Ability

Now that you know the IIMs’ Quant section cut off requirements, next you should check how much score you need to meet the threshold CAT Cut Off for Quantitative Ability section?

QA Cut off score Vs Percentile by Experts
CAT experts like IMS Learning, CL, Arun Sharma are unanimous on the low required score that you need to get CAT 2023 cut off 70, 75 or 80 percentile for QA section. Below are the slot wise take by experts on CAT score Vs Percentile.

Table 2: Slot 1 QA Score Requirement for 70 to 80 Percentile

Table 3: Slot 2 QA Score Requirement for 70 to 80 Percentile

Table 4: Slot 3 QA Score Requirement for 70 to 80 Percentile

Each correct answer in CAT carries +3 marks and each wrong answer gets negative -1 marking. So, how many questions you need to correctly answer and what you would lose with wrong answer – check below the implications of this data.

Let us take the example that you attempted 5 questions in QA section out of 22 and understand the implications: If you had correctly attempted 5 questions with no wrong answer, you would get 15 Marks. But if your one question goes wrong, you will lose 4 marks (-3 for wrong answer and -1 for negative marking) and will get 11 marks. In both the situations you will clear the sectional cut off.

You may ask, is scoring 10-12 marks in Quant enough to get an IIM Call? Continue reading to build the scenarios.

IIM Calls will depend on your Overall Percentile & ‘Profile’
All the IIMs will consider your academic score, work experience, academic/gender diversity to shortlist the candidates apart from CAT score and will award due weightage to each component. So, while sectional cut offs as announced by IIMs for shortlisting process 2024 are same for all sections, there are overall minimum CAT percentile cut offs that you first need to clear. Below are the overall minimum cut off as announced by IIMs for admission 2024:

Table 5: Minimum Overall CAT 2023 Cut off Percentile Required by IIMs

The above are the minimum CAT cut off requirement by IIMs. In fact, the actual cut off goes much higher, for example IIM Ahmedabad, IIM Bangalore, IIM Calcutta CAT cut off goes in the range of 97-99 percentile; IIM Kozhikode, IIM Lucknow CAT cut off goes in the range of 94-96 percentile. As such you will need a much higher percentile than the minimum cut off released by IIMs for admission 2024.

Weightage for CAT 2023 Percentile and Your Profile
Apart from the weightage awarded to performance in CAT 2023 exam, IIMs will award weightages to your profile and diversity in the shortlisting process for final selection round. Below are latest parameters and the weightages announced by IIMs in their admission policy 2024:   

Table 6: Latest Announced Shortlisting Parameters & Weightages by IIMs
Check the weightages announced by top three IIMs to different parameters in shortlisting process 2024

Implications for you!
So, what are the implications of all this data for you… Here are the key takeways:

• According to experts, you need approximately 10 marks to meet the QA sectional cut off. Similar is the case for other sections. So, you do have a chance to be considered for shortlisting…
• After shortlisting on the basis of sectional cut off, the overall CAT cut off is very much important. As shared above, the actual overall cut off goes much higher, you need to score above 95 overall percentile to get a call from one of the top 6 IIMs
• To get good weightage for Academic profile, you should have scored 85%+ marks in class 10, 12 and graduation to get maximum weightage.
• You can also earn weightage/marks for Academic Diversity (awarded only to Non-Engineers) and for Gender Diversity (provided you are a female).
• IIMs consider the duration and quality of work experience after completion of graduation and award weightage accordingly. Maximum Weightage is awarded for the work experience between 24 and 36 months of work experience.

So, if your profile is good and even if you get a low CAT score, you have the opportunity to score high on profile front which can compensate your low CAT score in getting the call from top IIMs.

Check your IIM Call chances, use IIM Call Predictor a simple tool to predict your Shortlisting chances and getting interview call from the 21 IIMs in just 5 minutes. Just enter your expected/actual CAT percentile, Academic profile, Work Experience, and see the results. The calculation of your IIM Call chances is based on the latest Cut Offs announced by IIMs or their previous cut offs.

Stay tuned to MBAUniverse.com for more updates on CAT 2023 and IIM Call 2024

Also Read:

• CAT Answer Key 2023
• CAT 2023 Response Sheet Release
• CAT Exam Analysis 2023
• CAT Score Vs Percentile 2023
• CAT Percentile Predictor 2023
• Top MBA Colleges in India Accepting CAT Score
• CAT Cut Off for IIMs & Top MBA Colleges