This is the most common question asked by many cat takers esp. those who have just started their preparation and it is the most difficult question to give an answer. One can be give the guidance only if all the details of that person are known. To find a standard answer to this question one must consider few parameters. Go through the following few lines carefully if are unsure about how much time you should spend on your preparation, it might help you.

Before preparing for CAT you must know your competency level in all the three departments that IIMs assess through CAT. There are very few persons who have the same level of competency in Maths, DI/DS and English. Out of the three, there must be one or two section which you like most and you can easily score high in CAT. My advice to all who are about to start their CAT preparation -The first thing you need to do is to arrange last year paper and attempt it as if you are appearing the real CAT.

While taking the test, be sure you are true to your self. Take the test for 15 minutes less than the allocated time (2 hours or 2.30 hrs). As it’s your first test you should give equal time to all the sections, during the test if you feel you have done enough to get a good score in that section continue with that section till the allocated time.(you are giving this test to judge your competency level). After you have done with your test check the answers .Match your results with last year cutoffs section wise.

If you have cleared the cutoffs then its great if not then check by how much marks you missed it. If you missed it by 2-4 marks then with a little bit of preparation you can cross the cut off level. 2 months of preparation with weekly 25-35 hours for the basics, then another 2 months on FLTs and revisions of basics should be sufficient. You should always fix last 2 & 1/2 months for Mocks.

If your score is in between than 60% - 80% of the cutoff, then you need to do a lot of hard work. It’s not that easy to increase the score in a very sort time span. You need to make a long term plan. I would suggest 4 months to basics. First check out in which area you find yourself comfortable. (for ex in Number System, Geometry, arithmetic, algebra ,etc ) Select only one section and give a full month or so to it. Start it from the basic and do all the problems in that section. Give few sectional tests without any time constrain and try to achieve 100%. With number of questions reducing & level of difficulty increasing, the importance given to accuracy should increase. When you find most of the questions are familiar to you go to another section.

If you have scored less than 60%, I ‘ll suggest please forget about IIM and target 2nd tier institutes. Less than 60% means you were not serious in your school and no way one can go to that level to learn the basics. You follow the methods that I have described earlier for 60% - 80% category. But if you feel you have all the basics but you couldn’t score well because of not remembering the formulas or for few silly mistakes then you can hope for IIMs too. In summery If you cleared the cutoff or missed it by 10%-20% then - 2/3 months of preparations + times for mocks should be your total time If you score 60% -80 % of the cutoff marks then -  5/6 months of preparation (with weekly 25-35 hours) + times for mocks should be your total time If you score less than 60% , start preparing now. Give how much time you can spend for your preparation.