10 MBA Entrance Exams available for students for MBA Admission

MBA Admission: Often students who may not have done well in CAT are seen to drop out and try again for next year CAT exam, in process losing out one full year in their career. Instead of waiting for next CAT to come (which is now held annually) and does not guarantee that desirable score may be achieved next year, one should try out the other entrance exam tests available. And there are many.

Why dropping out is not advisable?

Who has seen the future? Does it guarantee that one would reach his target scores next year? There are so many dynamic factors involved. Not only one is losing out a full year the competition increases too. The race doesn’t stop and the opportunity to stay ahead in the race becomes tougher.

It may be considered a good idea only in cases where the aspirant is working and is placed in decent organisation drawing a decent salary. But again question remains, will he or she be able to devote the time required for the preparation of the test, in that case along with his job?

Alternate options

Plenty of other options are available for getting in to a good B School offering a MBA or PGDM or PGP programs, which are all equivalent and are not seen to have any difference from the recruiters point of view. The recruiter is on the lookout for quality management graduates, remember always. They are not interested in just the degree and do not care much whether it is a MBA or PGDM program. It only matters if one is going ahead for some further studies to pursue research programs, may be in some foreign university.

Also remember all IIMs until recently (before the IIM bill passed in 2017) used to provide PGDM and not MBA.

Alternate MBA Entrance Exams like CAT, GMAT, XAT, MAT, CMAT, ATMA, NMAT are approved by AICTE and are widely accepted by many top colleges offering management programs. MBA graduates have the potential to earn more salaries than regular graduate.

MBA Entrance Exam Syllabus

Just like not all MBA programs are same, Entrance Exams are not same too. The syllabus and structure may vary from one another. But most of them have stress up on common topics like Quantitative Ability, Logical Reasoning, Data Interpretation.

Some exams like XAT and GMAT includes some topics like Decision Making and Analytical Writing Assessment.

List of MBA Entrance Exams 2019-20

Let’s take a deep look into each of them one by one.

1. CAT Exam

CAT Full Form: Common Admission Test
Conducting Institute: IIMs
CAT Eligibility: 50% in Graduation for General and 45% for Reserved. Final year students can also apply.
CAT Exam Pattern: CAT is an online exam. It has 3 sections with 3 hours of time resulting in 60 minutes for each section.
This is the Most common MBA entrance exam in INDIA preferred by top B-Schools and IIMs.

CAT Exam Syllabus:

1. Quantitative Ability
2. Verbal Ability & Reading Comprehension
3. Data Interpretation & Logical Reasoning

CAT Exam Date: Nov 24, 2019

2. XAT Entrance Exam

XAT Full Form: Xavier Aptitude Test
Conducting Institute: Xavier School Of Management
XAT Eligibility: candidates with any bachelor degree can apply. Final year students can also apply.
XAT Exam Pattern: Now XAT is also an online exam. Exam duration is three and a half hours. The exam is divided into two parts. Duration of part 1 is two hours and twenty minutes.
After CAT, XAT MBA entrance exam is the most preferred exam by the Institutions.

3. GMAT Entrance Exam

GMAT Full Form: Graduate Management Aptitude Test
Conducting Institute: GMAC
GMAT Eligibility: A degree from a reputed university is needed. There is no age limit for this exam.
GMAT Exam Pattern: There are 4 sections in this exam. Two sections have 30 minutes time and for the other 2 sections, it is 75 minutes. Total duration is 3 hours and 30 minutes. This exam pattern is different from other exams. It is a computer adaptive test. The first candidate has to answer a question if he answers it correctly then the difficulty level of the next question will be increased or it will be decreased. Higher difficulty questions have higher marks.

4. IIFT Entrance Exam

IIFT Full Form: Indian Institute of Foreign Trade

Conducting Institute: Indian Institute of Foreign Trade
IIFT Eligibility: Any Bachelor Degree holder can apply

IIFT Exam Pattern: The exam duration is 2 hours. It has 4 sections, that means 30 minutes for each section. Total Number of questions varies from 100-140. Questions from Quantitative Ability (20 questions), Data Interpretation (20 questions), and Reading comprehension (16 questions) will be awarded 1 mark for each question and 0.75 marks for Analytical & Logical Reasoning (22 questions), Verbal Ability (20 questions). And 0.50 marks for General Awareness (25 questions). â…“ mark will be deducted for the wrong answer.
IIFT Exam Date: Dec 02, 2019.
IIFT Exam Fee: 1550/- for General and OBC, 775/- for SC/ST/PH.

5. NMAT Entrance Exam

NMAT Full Form: NMIMS Management Aptitude Test
Conducting Institute: Graduate Management Admission Council (GMAC)
NMAT Eligibility: Minimum 3 years bachelor degree with 50%
NMAT Exam Pattern: NMAT is an online based Exam with a duration of 2 hours. And there is no negative marking for wrong attempts.

6. SNAP Entrance Exam

SNAP Full Form: Symbiosis National Aptitude Test
Conducting Institute: Symbiosis International University.
SNAP Eligibility: Graduation with 50%, Also final year students can apply.
SNAP Exam Pattern: Duration of the exam is 2 hours. The exam is divided into 4 sections leaving 30 minutes for each section. The exam is objective type with 4 options for every question. 1 mark will be awarded for every right answer and 25% or 0.25 marks will be deducted for every wrong answer.

7. CMAT Entrance Exam

CMAT Full Form: Common Management Admission Test
Conducting Institute: NTA
CMAT Eligibility: Candidates with any bachelor degree with 50% can apply. Final year students can also apply. For reserved candidates, 45% is required.

CMAT Exam Pattern: Exam duration is 3 hours. It has 100 Multiple choice questions divided into 4 sections, resulting in 25 questions in each section. For every right answer, 4 marks will be awarded and 1 mark will be deducted for every wrong answer. No negative marks for unanswered.

8. MAT Entrance Exam

MAT Full Form: Management Aptitude Test
Conducting Institute: All India Management Association (AIMA)
MAT Eligibility: Any Graduate can apply
MAT Exam Pattern: It is conducted both offline and online. Exam duration is 2 and a half hours. It has 5 sections with 40 questions each with a total of 200 questions. Each section has 30 minutes time. ¼ mark will be deducted for every wrong answer.

9. MICA Entrance Exam

MICAT Full Form: MICA Admission Test
Conducting Institute: MICA Ahmedabad
MICAT Eligibility: Graduation from a recognized university and Candidates must have appeared in at least 1 MBA Entrance Test like CAT, MAT, XAT, GMAT.
MICAT Exam Pattern: Duration of the exam is 2 hours 45 minutes. Questions can be subjective or objective. No negative marking is there for Descriptive and Psychometric Test.

10. TISSNET Entrance Exam

TISSNET Full Form: Tata Institute of Social Sciences
Conducting Institute: Tata Institute of Social Sciences
TISSNET Eligibility: Any graduate from a recognized university can apply.
TISSNET Exam Pattern: Duration of the exam is 1 hour 40 minutes. The exam will have 4 sections. That means 25 minutes per each section

TISSNET Exam Fee: N.A