Understanding XAT cutoff trends is crucial for setting realistic preparation goals and evaluating admission chances. The XAT 2026 cutoff score is expected to be between 95-96 percentiles for premier institutes like XLRI.
There is no major cut off difference between last year and year before that, the difference is between score and percentile of XAT exam. Many students claim last year's paper was easy comparatively and you can expect that this year's paper can be hard as the XAT exam follows an easy-hard pattern.
So for you to get more than 96 percentile, you need to score at least 30-35 marks and for 99 percentile you need to aim for 45 marks in XAT examination.
Business Management (BM) Program the cut off is following:
- General Category: 95-96 percentile
- OBC Category: 88-90 percentile
- SC Category: 82-85 percentile
- ST Category: 80-82 percentile
- PWD Category: 75-78 percentile
Cut off in XAT 2025
For the year 2025 XLRI BM Program interview cutoffs are 96 for male that have engineering stream and for females it's greater than equal to 91 percentile. For Non-engineer stream male it is 96 percentile and 91 percentile for female candidates.
Whereas in XLRI HRM program the cutoff for engineers is 95 for male and 90 for female candidate. For non engineering candidates it's 93 for male and 87 for female candidates.
As you can see there is no difference in BM program for XLRI students, so you can say that you need at least 96 percentile to get into your dream college in XAT examination.
XLRI BM Program Interview Cutoffs 2025 (Percentiles)
| STREAM | GENDER | TOTAL |
| Engineer | Male | ≥96 |
| Engineer | Female | ≥91 |
| Non-Engineer | Male | ≥96 |
| Non-Engineer | Female | ≥91 |
XLRI HRM Program Interview Cutoffs 2025 (Percentiles)
| STREAM | GENDER | TOTAL |
| Engineer | Male | ≥95 |
| Engineer | Female | ≥92 |
| Non-Engineer | Male | ≥93 |
| Non-Engineer | Female | ≥87 |
Cut off in XAT 2024
For the year 2024 the XLRI BM program interview cut offs are almost the same as 2025 but the difference is between the score of 2025 and 2024.
In 2024 the engineering stream male students have 96 percentile cut off and female students have 91 percentile as for non engineering students male students have 95 percentile and female students have 90 percentile.
For HRM program interview cutoff 2024 for engineering stream male is 95 percentile and female students is 90 percentile as for non engineering male students they have percentile of 93 where as the female candidate has 83 percentile cut off.
XAT 2024 BM Program interview cutoffs 2024 (Percentile)
| STREAM | GENDER | TOTAL |
| Engineer | Male | ≥96 |
| Engineer | Female | ≥91 |
| Non-Engineer | Male | ≥95 |
| Non-Engineer | Female | ≥90 |
XAT 2024 HRM Program interview cutoffs 2024 (Percentile)
| STREAM | GENDER | TOTAL |
| Engineer | Male | ≥95 |
| Engineer | Female | ≥90 |
| Non-Engineer | Male | ≥93 |
| Non-Engineer | Female | ≥88 |
Score VS percentile of XAT examination
For the year 2025 if you want to score an overall 99 percentile, you need to have at least 38.25 marks and for 96 percentile you need to have 32 marks. But in the year 2024 the percentile score has some gap. As in 2024 99 percentile means you have to score 36 marks and for 96 percentile you need to score 26 plus marks.
As you can see the clear difference between percentile and score, you need to score 30-35 marks for you to come in 96 percentile category and have your dream MBA college.
Year 2025 Score and Percentage Table:
| Marks | Percentile |
| 38.25 | 99 |
| 34 | 97 |
| 32 | 96 |
| 29 | 92 |
| 27.5 | 90 |
| 27 | 89 |
| 24.7 | 85 |
| 20 | 80 |
| 16 | 75 |
| 14.5 | 73 |
| 12 | 70 |
In Year 2024 Score and Percentage Table:
| Marks | Percentile |
| 36.3 | 99.5 |
| 33.5 | 99 |
| 26 | 95 |
| 23 | 90 |
| 18 | 80 |
Factors influencing score and percentile
There are manny factors that influence your score and percentile in your examination such as total number of candidates, difficulty of exam, participating institute and section-wise performance.
If the total number of candidates increases then the competition increases and it affects your percentile, now you need to score more just to keep up your percentile.
When the paper is difficult then your low score can get you a good percentile but this happens when your attempts are accurate. As you know this exam has negative marking, so you need to be careful before attempting a question.
Many XAT participating institutes have their own weightages and selection criteria which influence the cut off. For example some institutions have criteria of 97 percentile then you have to score more to qualify for that particular institution. The stand alone section also plays a crucial role as you need to score appropriately in each and every section so that you have good marks over all.
So to qualify your XAT exam you have to keep in mind to focus on all of the sections in the XAT examination.
Conclusion:
In conclusion, for a perfect XAT examination you need at least 90-96 percentile and if you are from the reserve category then this percentile can go down for you as the participating institute has reservation admission and for SC,ST and OBC categories. By these criteria you get an idea of how the XAT cutoff score helps in your admissions, so prepare accordingly and have admission in your favorite college via XAT.