How to Prepare for CAT 2017 in 3 months?
How to prepare for CAT 2017 in 3 months?: Tips, Tricks and Strategies to crack CAT 2017 in 3 months
How to Prepare for CAT 2017 in 3 months?
The Common Admission Test (CAT) conducted by the Indian Institutes of Management (IIM) is scheduled to be held on Sunday, November 26, 2017, in 2 sessions. This article will provide a 3-month study plan for all the CAT aspirants. CAT is a computer based test of three hours duration carrying 100 multiple choice objective type questions from three sections.
How to prepare for CAT 2017 in 3 months?
Month 1: Do a reality check
The first thing that every candidate should do is to do a reality check of his current level of aptitude and understand how strong the basics are. Go through the CAT 2017 syllabus and exam pattern thoroughly to have an idea of the topics. Try solving few sample papers to understand your weak and strong areas. You will also have an idea of your current level of preparation and how much more effort and time you are required to put in to raise your current level to preparation. It is very important to get your basics on track.
CAT 2017 Exam Pattern
S. No. |
Section |
Number of Questions |
Duration in minutes |
1 |
Verbal Ability & Reading Comprehension |
34 |
60 |
2 |
Data Interpretation & Logical Reasoning |
32 |
60 |
3 |
Quantitative Ability |
34 |
60 |
Total |
100 |
180 |
Collect the study material for CAT 2017 preparation
Once you know your level of preparation. Next step would be to collect books for preparation. Also, start clearing your basics. You may need to start from scratch and focus more on your weak areas. Having a time table for yourself will be useful and divide the topics according to this time table and try sticking to the same. Prepare these topics and solve as many questions as possible from each topic. The best approach would be to solve these questions in one or more ways so that you can end up exploring short and quick ways of solving it.
Have discussions with other CAT Toppers/ Experts
Devote this whole month in clearing your basics and understanding the topics. Try studying with other CAT aspirants who are also as serious as you are and share knowledge and learn new aspects. You can also connect with your seniors or experts and toppers and ask them for tips to crack CAT.
Cover maximum syllabus and topics
By end of this month, it is suggested to cover the maximum syllabus and all the important topics. Though it would be difficult to cover all the topics in one month put in extra effort and time into studies and you can cover maximum topics. Also, ensure that you keep revising the topics on regular basis.
Reading Newspapers and Novels – Reading newspapers every day is a great way to enhance your vocabulary. Also, cultivate the habit of reading good novels both fiction and not fiction. It is one of the best ways to improve your verbal skills and personality for an interview. Read any of these for at least an hour every day.
Month 2 : Start taking mock tests
Continue studying the way you did in the previous month but along with that start taking the mock test from this month. There are plenty of mock tests available on Toprankers.com. Go for every kind of mock test and keep a check on the difficulty level and prepare notes of the areas which you are not able to solve or which consumes more of your time. Do take the section wise mock tests as they will help you to check your level of preparation for each section. Analyzing mocks is very important to know where you are making the mistakes and then you can improve accordingly.
Go for a crash course if required
Once you get a clear idea of your preparation, if you see you are not getting good scores in the mock tests, it is advisable to join a crash course. Many coaching institutes offer a crash course for CAT preparation. However, it’s not always necessary to join coaching, but if you need an extra edge then you may enroll into one.
Take Arun Sharma CAT Challenge
Month 3: Take more and more sectional mock test
This is the last month for preparation and by now you must have the confident about the syllabus and topics that you study. Keep taking the mock tests especially the sectional ones to strengthen key areas important of your preparation. Concentrate more on your weak areas.
Solve previous year question papers
Apart from mock tests, do solve the CAT previous year question papers too. They will also help you a lot in understanding the kind of questions which are asked in the test. Continue this until the day of the exam. Also, remember to relaxed before your exams!
Stay tuned for more updates on How to prepare for CAT 2017 in 3 months!

Share your thoughts/queries here!