CMAT 2020 Preparation Tips, Books and Exam Pattern: The Common Management Admission Test (CMAT), one of the popular Management Entrance examination among MBA aspirants, will be conducted in January 2020, by National Testing Agency (NTA) unlike the all the previous years it was conducted by AICTE.
It is expected that the exam for CMAT 2020 will be conducted in two sessions – Morning and Evening on January 28, 2020, i.e. Sunday. The morning shift of CMAT 2020 exam will begin from 9:30 AM to 12:30 PM and the second shift of CMAT 2020 exam will be conducted from 2:30 PM to 5:30 PM.
CMAT score is useful for admission to MBA and PGDM programmes, it shortlists the applicants for B-Schools in 1000 management schools across India. It is high time to prepare CMAT 2020, as only 7 months are remaining for the final show. Students should know the CMAT 2020 Exam pattern, CMAT Syllabus, reference books to study, Preparation strategy and the study plan for the remaining exam period.
CMAT 2020 Exam Pattern
CMAT 2020 is an online test of a total duration of 3 hours. It comprises of total 100 question divided among Quantitative Techniques & Data Interpretation, Logical Reasoning, Language Comprehension and General Awareness. The questions are approximately divided in a follwing manner:
| Sections | No. of Questions | Total Marks |
| Language Comprehension | 25 | 100 |
| Data Interpretation and Quantitative Techniques | 25 | 100 |
| Logical Reasoning | 25 | 100 |
| General Awareness | 25 | 100 |
| Total | 100 | 400 |
All the sections have equal weightage. For each correct answer, 4 marks would be rewarded and for each incorrect answer, 1 mark would be deducted as negative marking. For an unattempted question, there are neither negative nor positive markings.
CMAT 2020 Reference Books
Collecting proper study material is the first step towards preparing for any exam. It is always recommended to go for books which authorized and whose content is appropriate. For competitive exams, it is better if a candidate prefers the latest editions as they keep updating with latest information. Some the books which are refered by toppers are:
Quantitative Ability:
Teach Yourself Quantitative Aptitude by Arun Sharma, Mc Graw Hill Publications
How to prepare for Data Interpretation for CAT by Arun Sharma, Mc Graw Hill Publications
Verbal Ability:
Verbal Ability & Comprehension for CAT/XAT/IIFT with 5 Mock Tests by Bharat Patodi and Aditya Choudhary
Verbal Ability and Reading Comprehension for CAT by Trishna Knowledge Systems
High School English Grammar and Composition Book (Multicolour Edition) By N.D.V. Prasada Rao
Logical Reasoning:
How to Prepare for Logical Reasoning for CAT by Arun Sharma
General Awareness:
For general awareness, refer to newspapers and magazines, etc. Also, keep updates with online News applications.
CMAT 2020 Preparation Tips
- Stay connected to advertisement releases
General awareness is an important part of the CMAT 2020 which can only be prepared by regularly reading newspapers and current affairs magazines. Candidate must try to keep in touch with all the affairs occurring worldwide in all aspects say sports, politics, events etc.
- Prepare a handbook
The candidate has to cram many formulas in order to prepare for quantitative ability and data interpretation, so maintaining a good formula book would be a great help in preparation and revision. Hence, all the formulas can be aggregated in a single book which reduces the wastage of time during revision.
- Self made Tricks
In order to prepare for logical reasoning and quantitative ability, learning tricks to solve questions is not a good option. Instead of learning, one must try to create their own tricka and shortcuts.
- Revision Break
While practicing you would come across hundreds of tricks and concepts you would need to solve questions,and revision will help you to make the best of your hardword on your previous topics. Your schedule must have time for revisions.
- Managing time
Competitive exams tend to have never ending syllabus, so managing your time among all the sections equally is really important. Try to practice maximum questions from all the important topics first and then move to the least important ones. Try to spend more time on the revision to make a great command on fundamentals.
- Mock Tests and Previous Year papers
Preparation of any test actually begins with solving mock tests and previous papers, they give a clear picture of how you need to prepare, what you need to prepare and what are the topics you need to more practice on. They help you see the bigger picture of the test.
CMAT Sectionwise Preparation strategy
Quantitative Ability: Make sure you devote 50-60 minutes daily on this section. QUANT section always has easier questions, based on fundamental concepts. Practice by solving maximum questions on topics which are frequently asked and make formula book to write their short notes.
Logical Reasoning: Try to invest 1-1.30 hours daily on Logical part, since it requires more focus and presence of mind also you need to do the maximum practice of questions.The more questions you would practice the faster you are likely to understand the concept.
Language Comprehension: Language Comprehensions includes 2–3 Reading Comprehension’s covering around 12 questions, Vocab based questions and also some Grammar questions and that much is okay for a single day, but make sure all the questions are distinct. Devote approximately 50 minutes to Language Comprehension would be enough.
General Awareness: CMAT 2020 GK syllabus is vast. It even includes a few Pictorial questions which have famous entities from Indian sportsperson to Chinese philosophers. Preparing GK would be a little difficult because there is no such particular book for that, it requires reading the newspaper and watching the news on a daily basis.
If someone is aiming for CMAT 2020, this is the high time that they should start taking it seriously and start practicing for the same so that they can make the best of their attempt. All the other updates related to CMAT 2020 will be posted by us. For any other queries, comment in the section below.
All the very Best to CMAT 2020 Aspirants. Here you got the details of CMAT 2020 preparation tips and strategy, Exam Pattern, and books for better CMAT score. Please post your Feedback or Comments regarding this article in the below comment box or on AfterGraduation Forum.
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