The analysis of the IBPS PO 2018 Prelim exam held on the 13th of October 2018 (Slot 1) has been presented below. Similar to the recently conducted SBI PO and Clerk prelim exams, the structure of even this exam presented a sectional time limit, no navigability between any section, and each section time bound for 20 minutes.

Snap shot of the Exam:

Test Area	No. of questions	Duration
Quantitative Aptitude	35 Questions	20 Mins
Reasoning Ability	35 Questions	20 Mins
English Language	30 Questions	20 Mins
Total no. of Questions	100 Qs	60 Mins

No of choices per question – 5

Negative marking: 0.25 of the marks assigned to each question

As per feedback received from our students who appeared for this exam, the exam can be rated as moderate. Although no major changes were reported in the prescribed pattern of the exam, a few changes worth noting are:

Introduction of a sectional time limit;

Modified Grammar question type

The section wise analysis of the above mentioned session, as reported by our students, is given below:

Quantitative Aptitude:

This section can be rated as moderate and was calculation based. No new question types / pattern of questions were asked in this slot of the exam.

There was no question on Simplifications, Approximations, Data Sufficiency and Data Comparison.

There were 10 to 12 questions (2 sets) on Data Interpretation (5-6 questions on Line Graph and 5-6 questions on Bar + Table). Questions on line graph were easy to moderate while questions on Bar+ Table were lengthy and calculation based. There were 5 questions each on Wrong number series and Quadratic Comparisons. Questions on Quadratic comparisons were easy to solve whereas questions on Wrong number series were moderate in nature.

Individual questions were 13 to 15 in number. These were a combination of easy, moderate and difficult ones.

A student could therefore, have solved around 17 - 19 questions in 20 minutes, if he chose judiciously.

Topic	No. of Questions
Data Interpretation (2 sets. Line graph and Bar + Table )	10 to 12
Number Series (Wrong number)	5
Quadratic Comparisons	5
Individual Questions:
Percentages	2
Profit & Loss	1
Partnership	3
Simple & Compound Interest	1
Averages	2
Mixtures and Alligation	2
Time and Distance	1
Boats & Streams	1

Reasoning:

This section has been given a 'Moderate' tag.

There were 20 questions on Puzzles (Linear, Circular, Floor based and on persons sitting around a Rectangular table), which were of moderate level of difficulty. There were five questions each on Coding – Decoding and Symbols and Notations. These questions ranged from easy to moderate. The three questions on Direction Sense were moderate and time-consuming.

About 20-22 questions could possibly be solved in 20 minutes. The topic -wise split, as reported by our students, is as given below.

Topic	No. of Questions
Puzzles (Linear, Circular, Floor based and on persons sitting around a Rectangular table))	20
Symbol and Notations	5
Coding - Decoding	5
Direction Sense	3
Miscellaneous (Word Formation etc..)	2

English Language :

This section has been tagged as 'Moderate’ by our students.

The lone Reading Comprehension passage was conventional in its presentation, and comprised 5 questions, of which 1 was a vocab question.

• Questions on Phrase Replacement comprised a sentence in which a part was in bold font. This was followed by three phrases numbered (I), (II) and (III), from which one of more could be picked from five choices listed below them.

• There were 6 questions on the conventional Error Identification pattern.
• There were 5 questions on single blank fillers and 6 questions on Cloze test.
• A comparatively new question type was posed this year to our test takers. A sentence with four words in bold, and numbered A, B ,C and D was given. A candidate was expected to read and decide if the words in bold were correct per se, or needed any rearrangement. The correct choice was to be picked accordingly.

Thus, about 15-17 questions could possibly be solved in 20 minutes in the English section. The break-up of the questions is as follows:

Topic	No. of Questions
Reading Comprehension	5
Error Identification (Conventional Model)	6
Phrase Replacement	4
Cloze Test	6
Fill in the Blanks (Single Blank)	5
Sentence with Words Jumbled	4

Over all, the paper was a combination of easy, moderate and difficult questions across all the three sections and can hence be rated as 'Moderate'.

Good Attempts and Expected Cutoffs:

Test Area	Good Attempts	Expected Cutoff
Quantitative Aptitude	18 - 20	10 - 12 Marks
Reasoning Ability	20 - 22	9 – 11 Marks
English Language	15 - 17	11 to 12 Marks
Overall	53 - 59	48 – 50 Marks

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