The XAT 2020 exam got over on 5th of January at 12:30pm. The XAT was undoubtedly the toughest exam of the year. The difficulty level of XAT exam was same as last year. This time the “Quantitative Ability and Data Interpretation was manageable but Decision Making section was tricky as expected. As the difficulty level of exam was high so it is expected thatXAT cut offs may remain low.
The major change this year was that many questions in a few sections and a complete section of Decision Making did not have negative marking. Though, this aspect was not clearly mentioned in the main instructions and therefore lot of students were not able to take the advantage of this feature.
XAT Exam analysis highlights:
- Test timing changed – 9.30AM to 12.30PM from 10AM to 1 PM last year
- Total questions increased to 100 from 99 last year
- Negative Marking of 25%.
- No Essay Writing test
- NAT Questions without negative marking introduced
- Decision Making section remains tricky
- Quant section is of moderate difficulty
- Many Candidates could attempt less than 50% questions
- GK section not counted for percentile calculation
- All questions were of MCQ type
- GK section not counted for percentile calculation
- Visually impaired candidates with scribe were given additional 25 minutes only for Part 1 of XAT.
- RC passages rated moderate
- Marks for every correct answer: 1
- All the MCQ type questions had five options with one correct option
- No Negative marking for General Knowledge section in part-2
- Expected XLRI cut off to remain 33-35 marks
Marking Scheme and Sectional Time-Limit:
- Every right question will carry 1 mark
- Part 1 of the XAT question paper is to be solved in 165 minutes
- Part 2 of the XAT question paper is to be solved in 15 minutes
- In case of 8 consecutive unanswered questions, 0.10 marks will be deducted.
XAT 2020 Analysis: Section Wise
Verbal Ability and Logical Reasoning:
- Total Questions: 26
- 4 RC Passages of about 300 words followed by total 14 Questions
- 1 poem of moderate difficulty level
- 12 Questions in Verbal Ability included Antonyms, Para-jumbles, Critical Reasoning
- Section difficulty was moderate
- Most of the questions were inferential
Topic wise break-up of questions:
| Topic | Number of Questions | Difficulty Level |
| Reading Comprehension | 12 | Moderate – Difficult |
| CR | 6 | Moderate |
| Poem Comprehension | 2 | Easy – Moderate |
| Grammar – Correct the sentence | 2 | Easy – Moderate |
| Para-jumble – 5 sentence | 2 | Moderate |
| Fill in the blanks -3 | 2 | Moderate – Difficult |
Decision Making and Analytical Reasoning:
- Total Questions: 21
- DM question sets were on various business related problems
- Questions were more difficult than last year
- No question was quant based
- DM Section had 7 sets of 3 questions each
- Some Problem sets were short and easy to read while some questions were ambiguous.
Topic wise break-up of questions:
| Section | No. of Questions | Difficulty Level |
| Decision Making | 21 | Moderate |
| Analytical | 0 | Moderate |
Quantitative Ability and Data Interpretation:
- Total Questions: 28
- More questions on Arithmetic (7 Questions)
- 22 Questions were on Quant
- 6 Questions were on Data Interpretation
- 2 DI sets in the section with 3 questions each
- Section difficulty level was moderate but was more difficult than last year
- 20 Quant questions were standalone questions
- 2 questions were in the form of a set on Venn Diagrams
- Out of 6 Questions on Geometry 3 were difficult
Topic wise break-up of questions:
| Topic | No. of Questions | Difficulty Level |
| Arithmetic | 8 | Moderate |
| Algebra | 3 | Easy-Moderate |
| Coordinate Geometry | 1 | Moderate |
| Geometry | 5 | Moderate-Difficult |
| Modern Maths | 1 | Difficult |
| Number system | 2 | Easy |
| DI (Set theory) | 2 | Moderate |
| DI (Bar Graph) | 3 | Moderate |
| DI (Table based) | 3 | Easy-moderate |
General Knowledge:
- Total Question 25
- No Break between part I & II was given
- GK questions were on moderate difficulty side
- Many questions in the section were from latest GK topic published by MBAUniverse.com
- Questions were framed on Budget sessions, History, Merger-Acquisition
Topic wise break-up of questions:
| Topic | No. of Questions | Difficulty Level |
| Current Affairs | 3 | Moderate |
| History | 4 | Moderate |
| Economy & Business | 4 | Moderate |
| Geography | 5 | Moderate |
| Personality & Awards | 2 | Moderate |
| Science & Tech | 5 | Moderate |
| Polity | 1 | Moderate |
| Books & Authors | 1 | Moderate |
| Sports | 0 | Moderate |
XAT 2020 Analysis: Overall Analysis
- Overall Cut off levels to remain 33-35 marks for XLRI
- XAT 2020 exam paper was on moderate to difficult side
- Decision Making to remain turning point in merit calculation.
- Many questions in Decision Making were found more difficult
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