CAT 2026 Exam Dates: Full Schedule & Important Deadlines

It lists every confirmed CAT 2026 date, from the registration window (now closed) to the day the scorecard stops counting. Where no confirmed date exists yet, it says so directly.

A CAT 2026 score stays valid only till 31 December 2027, in IIM Indore's own words. CAT runs once a year, every year. If that annual pattern holds, a full CAT 2027 admission season would likely finish before this score's validity window ends. That season would include its own registration window and its own exam day.

No official CAT 2027 date exists yet, so this is only a pattern-based observation, not a forecast. The point still holds: this score's validity window ends close to when the next full CAT cycle would finish, not far ahead of it.

IIM Indore fixed every date below in one document, the CAT 2026 Information Bulletin. IIM Indore released the bulletin on 26 July 2026, under Convener Prof. Aditya Billore. Not every date carries the same weight. The label after each one says why.

IIM Indore has locked four of these seven dates in writing, and nothing since has moved them. They are registration close, the admit card window's opening, the exam date, and the score's own expiry. The result date sits in a different category. The next section on it treats it as an expectation, not as an already-fixed fact.

CAT 2026 registration opened on 3 August 2026 at 10:00 AM. It closed on 22 September 2026 at 5:00 PM. IIM Indore set both times in the Information Bulletin. That window has already closed. It is not upcoming. A candidate reading this page today has no live application to file. The only option still open is the narrow post-close edit window. That window does not cover registration itself.

That window stayed open for forty-three days, counting 3 August through 22 September inclusive. That is simple arithmetic on two confirmed dates. It is not an unusually short or generous window for an exam this size. Every date after it on it runs off that same closing point.

The CAT 2026 admit card download window runs from 4 November 2026 to 29 November 2026, the exam day itself. IIM Indore fixed both dates in the Information Bulletin. This is a 25-day window, not a single release day. A candidate who misses day one can still download the admit card later.

Full download steps, what the admit card actually shows, and how to fix a printed error all sit on the CAT 2026 admit card page. That level of detail belongs there, not on this dates-only page.

IIM Indore has fixed CAT 2026 for Sunday, 29 November 2026. The exam runs in three sessions across roughly 170 test cities. IIM Indore confirmed this directly in its Information Bulletin and Press Release. IIM Indore assigns each candidate to exactly one of the three sessions. Nobody picks their own slot. The exam city also comes from the five city preferences a candidate lists at registration.

IIM Indore's bulletin fixes the session count at three. It does not publish exact clock-times for each session anywhere in the document.

Treat the three windows above as a planning estimate, not a printed fact. The only clock-time worth relying on is the one printed on a candidate's own admit card. That admit card is downloadable from 4 November 2026.

The CAT 2026 Information Bulletin does not mention an answer key at all. It gives no release date, no process, and no line confirming whether IIM Indore will issue one. A full read of the bulletin and the press release, both dated 26 July 2026, confirms this.

If IIM Indore follows that pattern, an answer key would likely land in the first two weeks of December 2026. That timing is its own inference from past behaviour, not a figure from the bulletin. Treat it as an estimate, nothing more.

IIM Indore's own words: CAT 2026 results "are likely to be declared by the First week of January, 2027." That is the entire official statement on the result date. It does not say results will be declared then. It says they are likely to be declared then. That is a different and weaker claim.

Just over a month separates exam day, 29 November 2026, from that expected result window. That gap is simple arithmetic on two confirmed dates. It is not an unusual gap for an exam scoring a couple of lakh candidates across three sessions. The result date itself remains a stated expectation, not a locked one, until IIM Indore confirms it closer to the time.

CAT 2026 does not run one common counselling calendar the way the exam date or the registration window does. Once IIM Indore declares the result, each of the 21 IIMs, and every other CAT-accepting institute, calls candidates for its own Written Ability Test and Personal Interview. This is commonly called WAT-PI. Each institute runs WAT-PI on its own schedule, built around its own composite-score formula.

That means there is no single "CAT 2026 counselling starts on X date" fact to publish. It will not manufacture one to fill the gap.