What is Difference Between CAT and XAT Entrance Exams

By Adarsha St

Updated: Friday, July 10, 2026, 3:43 [IST]

Common Admission Test (CAT) for the year 2013 commenced from 16 Oct and to will end on 11 Nov 2013.

Xavier Aptitude Test (XAT 2014) entrance exam will be held on 5th Jan 2014, Sunday.

Now, you'll find the difference between these entrance exams on Oneindia Education channel.

What is Difference Between CAT and XAT exams

About XAT exam:

Exam Pattern:

1. The exam will consist of two parts, Paper 1 and Paper 2.

Paper 1 is objective paper with multiple choice questions. The sections of this paper are Verbal Ability, Decision Making, Quantitative Aptitude and General Awareness.
Paper 2 is Essay writing.

2. XAT 2014 will have around 80 to 90 questions.

Time Duration:

The total duration of XAT 2014 exam will be 2 hours 40 to 45 minutes.
The Part 2 of XAT is subjective in nature. It consists of the Essay Writing section. The duration of the Essay Writing question was 20 minutes.

Syllabus:

Syllabus contains components of mathematics, English, Data Interpretation & Logical Reasoning, General Knowledge and Essay Writing. The XAT 2014 exam will include the sections of Verbal & Logical Reasoning, Decision Making and Quantitative & Data Interpretation. The Part 2 of the XAT 2014 exam will include Essay Writing and General Awareness section.

About CAT Exam:

Test Duration:

The test comprises of two sections that are separately timed. Each of the sections will be held for 70 minutes (1 hour and 10 minutes). It consists of 30 questions in each section.
Within the 70 min provided for the section, candidates can review the answers. Once the time ends for the first section, they will move to the second section and will no longer be able to go back.
A 15-minute tutorial will be provided before the start of the test, and candidates are advised to go through that carefully before starting the main examination.
The total duration will be two hours and thirty five minutes including the tutorial. A practice test to provide candidates with a feel of the timed sections, as well as navigation and functionality of the actual test will be made available in the coming weeks.

Test Pattern:

The test comprises of two sections:

(a) Quantitative Ability & Data Interpretation
(b) Verbal Ability & Logical Reasoning.

Once a section ends, aspirants can no longer go back to it. Aspirants will be presented with the section on Quantitative Ability & Data Interpretation first, followed by Verbal Ability & Logical Reasoning. Candidates will be given 15 minutes tutorial before the commencement of the main exam.

But the main difference lies in negative marking of the wrong answers. Negative marking in XAT is less than that of CAT.

XAT penalises by one fourth mark whereas CAT penalises by one third. For example - if one mark is awarded for every correct answer, 1/3 and 1/4 will be deducted by CAT and XAT for every wrong answer, respectively.