RBI Assistant Cut Off: Previous Year Trends and Target Score

The RBI Assistant cut-off is the minimum score you need to move from one stage to the next. RBI sets it separately for each recruiting office and category, and it also fixes sectional minimums that every candidate must clear. A good total can still fail if one section falls short, so you need to understand all three layers: sectional, overall and office-wise.

Cut-offs change every cycle with paper difficulty, the number of vacancies and the number of applicants. Treat the figures here as a benchmark only, and aim for a clear margin above them rather than a bare pass. The figures below come from third-party compilations of RBI results, not from a document we could open on the RBI site, so verify them on the official website: https://www.rbi.org.in/

How the cut-off works

The Prelims cut-off does not carry into the Main exam, and final merit uses Main marks only. For how the stages are built.

Previous sectional cut-offs

Sectional minimums have been fairly stable across cycles. In earlier Main exams, the reported minimum in each of the five sections was 14 out of 40 for General and EWS, 12 for OBC and 11 for SC, ST and PwBD candidates. For the 2026 Prelims, one compilation reports sectional cut-offs of 12 in English, 14 in Numerical Ability and 14 in Reasoning for General and EWS candidates. Treat these as indicative until you check the official result notice.

Previous office-wise cut-off trend

Office-wise cut-offs differ widely because each office has its own vacancies and applicant pool. The table below shows a small sample of reported General category figures, so you can see the range.

Figures are as reported by third-party sources. Reserved categories have lower cut-offs, and some offices show no cut-off for a category where no candidate qualified or no vacancy existed. The pattern is clear, though: Prelims cut-offs for General candidates have been very high in recent cycles, often in the 90s out of 100, so Prelims needs high accuracy and not just a pass.

What affects the cut-off

• Paper difficulty: A tougher Prelims or Main lowers the cut-off, and an easy paper pushes it up.

• Vacancies in your office: Offices with few seats can still have high cut-offs because many candidates compete for them.

• Number of applicants: Larger applicant pools in popular offices raise the competition.

• Normalisation: When an exam runs in several shifts, scores may be adjusted to account for difficulty differences between shifts.

How to set your target

• Start from your office: Check the previous cut-off for your chosen office and category, then add a margin of at least 5 marks in Prelims and 8 to 10 marks in Main.

• Protect every section: Aim for a score in each section well above the sectional minimum, not just a good total.

• Benchmark with mocks: Use full-length tests to see whether your mock average stays above your target for several attempts in a row.

• Watch accuracy: With a one-fourth penalty, an 85% accuracy at 80 attempts often beats 95 attempts at 70% accuracy.