Understanding Normalisation in CAT 2025: CAT uses normalisation because each slot has slightly different difficulty levels.

Why Normalisation?

Every slot has different questions. Some slots may be easier, and some harder. To ensure fairness, CAT adjusts scores so no student is at a disadvantage.

What is Normalisation?

CAT uses a statistical method that compares:

• Average performance of each slot
• Standard deviation of scores in each slot
• Difficulty variation between slots

Then, your raw score is converted into a scaled score.

CAT uses a normalisation process because each slot has:

• Different question sets
• Slightly different difficulty levels
• Different student ability distributions

How Normalisation Works

CAT applies a statistical process similar to that used in GATE and other multi-shift exams:

1. Mean score of each slot is computed.
2. Standard deviation of each slot is analysed.
3. A scaling formula adjusts raw marks to ensure fairness.
4. Your scaled score appears on the scorecard, not raw score.
5. Percentile is calculated using scaled scores across all candidates.

How CAT 2025 Normalisation & Scoring Works

Because CAT is held in multiple slots (morning, afternoon, evening), each slot may have slightly different difficulty levels even if the structure remains the same. To ensure fairness across thousands of candidates, CAT applies a statistical normalization (scaling) process instead of comparing raw scores directly.

Step-by-Step: From Raw Score to Percentile

Raw Score Calculation: For each candidate, raw marks are computed based on correct and incorrect answers (MCQs: +3 for correct, -1 for wrong; TITA or unattempted as per marking scheme).

Slot-wise Statistics: For each exam slot and for each section (VARC, DILR, QA), CAT computes the mean and standard deviation (SD) of raw scores for all candidates in that slot.

Overall Statistics: CAT also calculates the mean and SD across all slots combined.

Scaling or Equi-percentile Mapping: Each candidate's raw section-wise score is transformed into a scaled score based on where it stands relative to slot mean, slot SD, overall mean, and overall SD. This ensures performance is measured fairly regardless of slot difficulty.

Percentile and Final Scorecard: Scaled scores from all sections are combined, and a percentile rank is assigned based on relative standing among all test-takers. Admissions shortlists use percentiles, not raw scores.

TITA Issue in the response sheet

The response sheet released on 5th December 5 PM had an issue with the TITA options in the Quants section, the TITA correct answers were not provided, it was marked as NA. Due to this the correct marks were not being displayed in the CAT Score Calculator Tools. 

This mistake was however corrected on 6th December around 11 am, but the students had to login to the portal and fetch the new response sheet.

CAT 2025 Events 

• IIM Kozhikode released the official notification for CAT 2025 as the conducting institute.
• Registration window: 01 August 2025 (10:00 AM) to 13 September 2025 (5:00 PM IST).
• The exam date: 30 November 2025.
• The exam is conducted in three slots — Slot 1, Slot 2, Slot 3.
• Official slot timings (as per 2025 schedule):
  – Slot 1: 08:30 AM – 10:30 AM
  – Slot 2: 12:30 PM – 02:30 PM
  – Slot 3: 04:30 PM – 06:30 PM
• Approximate number of test-takers: Nearly 2.95 lakh candidates appeared across slots in 2025.
• The response sheet and provisional answer key for 2025 were released on 4 December 2025, 5 pm 
• The objection window for the answer key challenges is open till 10th December 2025
• Result / Scorecard release: current official expectation is late December 2025 or the first week of January 2026, though earlier estimates anticipated mid-December

Conclusion

Understanding CAT 2025 normalisation is crucial for interpreting your scaled score and percentile accurately. Since each slot has its own difficulty level, the normalisation process ensures that every candidate is evaluated fairly, regardless of which slot they appeared in. With the official response sheet, answer key, and objection window now active, students should closely track updates to stay informed about cut-offs, score trends, and admission criteria.

For real-time updates, expected cut-offs, percentile insights, and to calculate your scaled CAT score more accurately, visit the profile portal.