NMAT-2023 consists of three sections, each containing 36 questions. The option to skip to the next question without answering the current question has been disabled, making it mandatory for students to attempt all the questions. Since the exam is adaptive, students will be rewarded more for answering tougher questions correctly compared to easier questions. The topic-wise questions served to students in each of the sections vary for each student.

NMAT 2023: Exam Pattern

Let’s take a look at the individual section-wise analysis of NMAT-2023.

Language Skills (Verbal Ability and Reading Comprehension)

The Language Skills section was balanced with questions from Reading Comprehension (2 passages with 4 questions each), Para-jumbles, Grammar, and Vocabulary-based questions, with equal emphasis on each of these topics.

Complexity Level: Easy to Moderate

The Section Division is tabulated below:

Quantitative Skills (Quantitative Ability and Data Interpretation)

The Quantitative Skills section of NMAT-2023 contained Arithmetic and Data Interpretation (2 DI sets of 4 questions each), as well as Data Sufficiency questions (4 questions) that were relatively moderate. The section predominantly focused on modern math and numbers. As expected, there were no Geometry questions.

Complexity Level: Moderate

The Section Division is tabulated below:

Logical Reasoning (Logical Reasoning and Critical Reasoning)

The Logical Reasoning section comprised of 17 Analytical Reasoning questions which were easily doable and 19 Verbal Reasoning questions were lengthy and challenging. 

Complexity Level: Moderate

The Section Division is tabulated below:

Overall, the difficulty level of NMAT 2023 is moderate in terms of the questions asked. However, it also depends on the ability of the candidate as NMAT 2023 is a “Computer Adaptive” exam. All these sections have been modified on many aspects.

NMAT 2020 comprised of 3 sections – each containing 36 questions. The option to skip to the next question without answering the current question was disabled, making it mandatory for the students to attempt all the questions. As the exam is Adaptive, students were rewarded more for answering tougher questions correctly as compared to easier questions. The topic–wise questions served to the students in each of the sections shows variation for each of the students.

MAT 2014 was quite predictable with respect to the pattern and the difficulty level. The exam was easy-to-moderate and the overall cut-off remained the same.

NMAT 2020 is being conducted in an 88-day test window from 4th November 2020 to 30th January 2021 and like last year, it is being administrated by GMAC. NMAT has had a very standardized pattern in the last few years which has very low chances of changing drastically. With respect to the pattern and structure of the exam, candidates can heave a sigh of relief. The overall difficulty level too will be along similar lines. The overall cut-off is expected to be around 208-210, which is the range around which the last few years' cutoffs have hovered. We can expect a little ambiguity from the sectional difficulty levels and sectional cutoffs can fluctuate by small margins.

For NMAT 2016, Quantitative Skills sectional cut-off rose from 70 to 74, despite the presence of highly calculation-intensive Data Interpretation questions, as the standalone quant questions were easier than last year. This shows that there can be varying difficulty levels even within a single section. A candidate should try to attempt around 75-80 questions to make it to a safe score of between 210-230, after accounting for a few errors. Since sections are timed, understanding of fundamentals and the speed of attempting questions are the 'make or break' factors.

As there is no penalty for wrong answers, candidates should adopt a strategy wherein they attempt all the questions. About 80 questions out of 120 should be genuine attempts and the rest could be guesses/calculated risks based on elimination. If a candidate is purely guessing on the rest of the questions, then all the answer choices selected should be the same options as this maximizes the probability of getting a few of them correct!