XAT Analysis 2025 – Expected Cutoffs, Difficulty Level, Types of Questions

XAT (Xavier Aptitude Test) 2025 was conducted online on January 5, 2025, between 2 PM and 5 PM. The test had some changes in the exam structure this year. The essay section was removed and questions in the GK section were reduced to 20. The total time for the exam was also cut down to 180 minutes. Read on to see what our XT analysis by IMS experts reveals about this test. 

The structure of the test, along with suggested time allocation, good attempts, and estimated cut-offs based on the feedback from IMS students and experts, are in the table below: 

XAT Analysis 2025 – Highlights

The Question Paper consisted of:

Part-1 questions invited negative marks of – 0.25 for each incorrect response. In addition, there was a penalty of  -0.1 mark for every unattempted question after 8 unattempted questions.

XAT Analysis 2025 – Final Verdict

Based on the inputs received from students and IMS mentors who appeared for the test and based on the actual cutoffs over the last two years, we estimate the following cutoffs for XLRI BM and HRM programs:

Overall, XAT-2025 was similar in difficulty level to XAT 2024. The DM Section was on par with the same last year with a few questions in DM being difficult. The VALR section was slightly more challenging than the same section in XAT 2024. In the QA-DI section, the QA portion was slightly easier than XAT-2024, but the DI portion was slightly more challenging than XAT-2024.

Based on the inputs received from students and IMS mentors who appeared for the test and based on the actual cutoffs over the last two years, we estimate the following cut-offs for XLRI BM and HRM programs:

XLRI BM Program

XLRI HRM Program 

SECTIONAL ANALYSIS

Note: For both BM and HRM programs of XLRI, the overall cutoff is significantly greater than the sum of the sectional cutoffs. Therefore, the number of good attempts for different sections has been estimated from the point of view of a student who wishes to maximize the score in that section.

Part-1

Verbal Ability and Logical Reasoning Section (26 questions) 

There were 17 Reading Comprehension questions and 9 Verbal Ability/Reasoning questions. The Verbal ability/Verbal Reasoning questions were a fair mix of grammar, vocabulary, and reasoning-based questions (Critical Reasoning and Jumbled Paragraphs). The RC questions were distributed among five passages and one poem. The poem-based RC was difficult. The remaining five passages were of 300 – 450 words each approximately; they had a mixture of mostly medium to difficult questions. Many of the questions were inferential and application-based. 

An attempt of about 13-14 questions in this section in about 55-60 minutes, with about 75-80% accuracy would be considered a good attempt.

Decision Making (21 questions)

This section consisted of 21 questions. There was no Quantitative DM set in this year’s test.

The section consisted of 7 sets of 3 questions each. As usual, some questions had a fair deal of ambiguity – in that either no answer seemed correct or more than one option appeared correct. Overall, the questions were of medium difficulty. Therefore, the choice of sets/questions to attempt would have depended mainly on your personal preferences and strengths.

In about 50-55 minutes, an attempt of about 11-12 questions with about 75-80% accuracy would be considered to be good.

Quantitative Aptitude and Data Interpretation (28 questions)

Out of the 28 questions in the section, 16 were on Quantitative Ability and 12 were on Data Interpretation.  

In Arithmetic 1 question was on Ratio Proportion, 1 question was on Simple Interest, and 1 question was on Averages. In Algebra, 2 questions were on Coordinate Geometry. In Geometry, 1 question was on Mensuration, 1 question was on Circles, 1 question was on Frustum, and 2 questions were on Quadrilaterals. In Modern maths, 1 question was on Probability and Quadratic Equations, and 1 question was on Logarithm. In Numbers, 1 question was from HCF-LCM and 1 question was on Indices. 

There were four sets of Data Interpretation with 3 questions in each set. One set was based on Arithmetic, one was based on Averages, one was Number-matrix based and one was Scatter Plot / Line Graph based. Among these 4 sets, two were reasoning based DI sets and one was observation based set. 

As a whole, the QA portion was slightly easier than XAT-2024, but the DI portion was slightly more challenging than XAT-2024. 

Following is the break-up of the questions in the section:

An attempt of about 18-19 questions (with about 80 percent accuracy) in about 55-60 minutes would be considered a good attempt. 

Part-2 

General Knowledge

The 20 GK questions comprised 12 current affairs questions and 8 static GK questions. As usual, the questions covered a wide range of areas and gave no special advantage to specialists in any one area. 

To maximize the score in this section, one should have attempted 10 – 11 questions seriously. Additionally, as there was no negative marking in this section, all the remaining questions should also have been attempted. A score of 5 – 6 would be a good score in this section.