National Eligibility cum Entrance Test, NEET 2025 exam is upon us. National Testing Agency, NTA will conduct the NEET UG tomorrow – May 4, 2025. With nearly 23 lakh candidates expected to appear, it is by far one of the largest national level examinations conducted by India. What does it take for a candidate to crack NEET examination?
What is the level of competition? Are the chances of cracking NEET UG less for General Category? Let us look at the number of seats and how it adds up.
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NEET Exam for admission to MBBS, BDS, Ayush, Nursing Seats
NEET is the entrance test for admission to all medical and dental courses in the country. This includes MBBS and BDS seats. Apart from these two, NEET result is also used for admission to Ayush courses as well as B. Sc Nursing seats in central institutions. Let’s look at a quick break up of the number of seats available across the country.
| MBBS | 1,18,190 |
| BDS | 27,618 |
| Ayush & Veterinary Courses | 55,851 |
There are a total of 780 medical colleges in the country and 323 dental colleges. Admission to all will be done on the basis of NEET Result.
Breaking these down further, considering 23 lakh students appear, only about 5% of these students will be successful in finding an MBBS seat, just about 1% will be successful in finding a BDS seat and success rate for Ayush and Veterinary courses would be about 2%.
Are General Category Students Worst Off in NEET due to Reservation?
One of the biggest concerns raised by many parents is the unfair card dealt out to General Category students. In a certain manner, it is perhaps true. The cut off for general category is much higher than the reserved category. This, however, does not truly create a disadvantage for them.
Taking the number of category wise students who appeared in NEET 2024, let us look at the success rate of finding a seat.
For ease of calculation, we have taken a percentage divide across all MBBS seats available in the country (and not divided into state and All India quota). Interestingly, the success rate for general category student finding a seat is much higher (given the number of candidates appearing for the examination in each category).
| Category | No. of Candidates appeared in NEET’24 | Category wise MBBS Seats (Approx) | Success Rate |
| OBC | 1026321 | 31911 | 3% |
| SC | 344309 | 17729 | 5% |
| ST | 150178 | 8864 | 6% |
| General | 625446 | 47867 | 8% |
| EWS | 186908 | 11819 | 6% |
What makes it rather skewed is that 5% success does not translate into top 5% candidates. Also, the distribution is on the basis of cut off marks, and there is a large disparity between categories when it comes to cut off percentile.
NEET Eligibility for MBBS and Seat Matrix
As per the rules, students need to place in the Top 50 percentile. This is not the same as scoring 50% marks in NEET. For reserved category students, the qualifying marks are 40 percentiles.
NEET exam is of 720 marks. The result, however, is converted into a percentile score – range across which candidates have scored marks out of 720. The students are accordingly given a percentile rank. All students who are in top 50 percentile (unreserved) and 40 percentile (reserved) categories are then eligible for participating in counselling for admission to the various medical, dental, Ayush and nursing seats. Here is a look at the cut off marks for NEET 2024.
| Category | Qualifying Percentile | Score Range |
| General (UR)/EWS | 50th Percentile | 720 – 162 |
| OBC | 40th Percentile | 161 – 127 |
| SC | 40th Percentile | 161 – 127 |
| ST | 40th Percentile | 161 – 127 |
| General-PwD | 45th Percentile | 161 – 144 |
| OBC/SC/ST-PwD | 40th Percentile | 146 – 127 |
In other words, a general category student needs to roughly score more than 162 marks to qualify NEET 2025 examination but to get an MBBS seat, the marks cut off would be much much higher at 600. In comparison, the cut off for other categories is much lower. But when we factor in the number of students appearing in each set catgeory, the differences are somewhat reduced.
On the other hand, the facilities available to many backward classes and economically weaker sections is indeed concerning. What adds to the disparity is when a reserved category student with high marks shifts to open category seat. The end result, skewed seat matrices.
What is needed is a deeper mathematical analysis to ensure an equitable chance to all students, across categories. Right to education and fair assessment is a fundamental right of every child. But somehow, the numbers don’t add up.
NEET 2025 Exam
NEET will be conducted in pen and paper mode across the country. Over 23 lakh candidates are expected to appear in one of the largest entrance examinations conducted by NTA. The paper will be conducted in 13 languages (English, Hindi, Urdu and 10 regional languages). Exam will begin at 2 pm and entry to examination centre will close at 1:30 pm sharp.