UPSC Cut Off Marks - Prelims and Mains

UPSC conducts the All-India Exam, Civil Services Examination (CSE) every year. The exam takes place in three stages – Prelims, Mains, and the Interview. To pass each stage, the candidates are required to score marks above the UPSC Cut Off that is decided by the commission. For the understanding of the IAS Exam, this article will provide you information on the UPSC Cut-Off marks for IAS Prelims 2019; how is UPSC Cut-Off calculated; and the year-wise official cut-off of the civil services exam. 

Official UPSC Cut Off 2019 will be released by 19th August 2020 (tentatively) as on 4th August 2020, Civil Services Examinations Final Result 2019 has been declared. Candidates can UPSC Result 2019 in the linked article.

Facts about UPSC Cut Off

The following points can clear doubts on how UPSC Cut Off is calculated:

• The UPSC prelims cut off marks are based on General Studies I only. The General Studies II or the CSAT paper is not counted for merit ranking and is only qualifying in nature. The GS II paper requires candidates to score at least 33% in it to qualify for the mains. To read in detail how IAS Cutt Off is decided, check — How Does the UPSC Decide the Cut-off for UPSC Prelims Exam?
• The UPSC cut off marks indicate the marks of the last candidate who was selected based on the number of vacancies in a particular category. The UPSC releases the cut off marks for both Prelims and Mains only after the final result of the Civil Services Exam for that particular year is declared.

UPSC Cut Off – IAS Prelims 2019

The UPSC Prelims 2019 was conducted on June 2, 2019, and the expected UPSC Prelims cutoff score should be in the range of 95-100 for the general category. Only those candidates who score above the UPSC Prelims cutoff will qualify for the Mains stage of the exam.

Check UPSC Answer Key 2019 here.

The table below mentions the expected UPSC Cut-Off 2019 for all the categories:

Candidates should know that cut-off for IAS, IPS, and IFS remains the same.

UPSC Cut off 2018 Prelims

The cut-off marks for the UPSC prelims exam 2018 is 98 for the general category. The category-wise minimum qualifying marks for prelims of IAS Exam are given in the following table.

UPSC Cutoff Marks 2018:-Download PDF Here

A general candidate needed only 98 out of 200 marks in the GS I paper to clear the 2018 IAS prelims. If you analyse, this is lower than the cut-off marks of both the 2017 and 2016 UPSC Prelims exams. While it was 105.34 in 2017, it was 116 in 2016.

UPSC Mains Cut Off 2018

The cut-off marks for the IAS mains (written) exam 2018 is 774 for the general category candidates. Take a look at the next table, it gives the mains (written) exam cut off marks in the various categories.

Check the image to get the UPSC Cut Off 2018 (Mains) details below:

Candidates who scored a minimum of 774 marks (which 49%) in the mains written exam would have cleared it. This is subject to the candidates securing at least 10% marks in each of the seven papers namely, Essay, GS I, GS II, GS III, GS IV, Optional I and Optional II. And of course, the candidates would also have had to qualify the language papers (English and Indian language) with at least 25% of the marks.

The UPSC has also released the total marks secured by the last person in every category. The next table gives you those numbers:

Year-Wise UPSC Prelims Cut-Off (2011-2016)

Aspirants can refer to the table below to check out the trends in cut-off for the years 2011-2016:

UPSC Prelims Cut Off 2016

UPSC Prelims Cut Off 2015

UPSC Prelims Cut Off 2014

UPSC Prelims Cut Off 2013

UPSC Prelims Cut Off 2012

UPSC Prelims Cut Off 2011

Year-Wise UPSC Mains Cut-Off (2005-2015)

Aspirants can refer to the table below to check out the trends in cut-off for the years 2005-2015: