Graduate Pharmacy Aptitude Test(GPAT)

About the exam

About GPAT

The GPAT exam decides who holds a qualifying score for M.Pharm admission and for the Pharmacy Council of India's postgraduate stipend, and in 2026 only 5,362 of the 53,617 candidates who sat it were declared qualified. That figure is set by rule, not by difficulty: a candidate has to clear a category percentile and also rank inside the top 10% of everyone who appeared.

NBEMS sets the paper and publishes the result. Seats and the stipend are decided elsewhere, by state admission bodies, individual institutes and PCI.

GPAT sits with the Pharmacy Council of India (PCI), which took on conducting the exam and disbursing its scholarship and entered into a memorandum of understanding with the National Board of Examinations in Medical Sciences (NBEMS) to conduct it, as the NBEMS GPAT examination page records. The same page traces who ran it before: AICTE held the first GPAT in 2010 and every year to 2018, the National Testing Agency conducted it from 2019 to 2023, and PCI's move honours the Supreme Court judgment of 5 March 2020 that pharmacy education would be governed by the Pharmacy Act, 1948. NTA's last sitting was GPAT 2023, held on 22 May 2023 according to the NTA press release declaring GPAT 2023 scores, and a PCI circular of 5 April 2024 on GPAT conduct and scholarship announced that, from 2024, the Council would conduct GPAT through NBEMS.

The GPAT 2026 Information Bulletin describes GPAT as a national examination for awarding scholarship to candidates seeking entry to the Master of Pharmacy, and says the score is accepted by PCI approved or affiliated university departments, constituent colleges and affiliated colleges for M.Pharm and PhD admission. The board's part ends once the result reaches PCI: the bulletin rules NBEMS out of counselling and scholarship payments alike, and warns that sitting GPAT gives no automatic claim on an M.Pharm seat or the scholarship.

At a glance

GPAT highlights

Calendar

Important dates

NBEMS held GPAT 2026 on 7 March 2026 and declared its result on 7 April 2026. The bulletin, the answer key notice and the result notice dated each stage of that cycle:

The exam has not stayed in one month across the NBEMS cycles. GPAT 2024 was held on 8 June 2024, according to the GPAT 2024 result notice. GPAT 2025 followed on 25 May 2025, according to the GPAT 2025 result notice, and the GPAT 2026 result notice records the 2026 paper on 7 March 2026.

The most recent tentative schedule of forthcoming NBEMS examinations, dated 29 April 2026, gives tentative dates for NEET-SS 2026, FMGE December 2026 and DrNB final examinations running into 2027, and carries no GPAT 2027 date.

Who can apply

Eligibility criteria

The GPAT 2026 bulletin's eligibility chapter admits candidates who meet the citizenship rule and one of the degree conditions:

• Citizenship: the candidate must be a citizen of India. The application's nationality field then separates resident Indians from Indian citizens who are NRIs.
• Completed degree: a Bachelor's degree in Pharmacy (4 years after 10+2, including lateral entry students) or an equivalent from a recognised university.
• Final year: students appearing in the fourth-year B.Pharm examination whose result will be declared before M.Pharm admission for 2026-27 begins.
• Pre-final year: students appearing in the third-year examination whose final-year result will be declared before M.Pharm admission for 2027-28 begins.

B.E. or B.Tech graduates in Pharmaceutical and Fine Chemical Technology, and equivalent, are not eligible. The bulletin also tells candidates to confirm before applying that their B.Pharm is recognised under Section 12 of the Pharmacy Act, 1948, because a candidature or result resting on an unrecognised degree is cancelled, as the GPAT 2026 bulletin warns.

The eligibility chapter of the GPAT 2026 bulletin sets no minimum B.Pharm marks and no age limit for sitting the exam. Eligibility stays provisional throughout, since the bulletin's result chapter says NBEMS does not verify what candidates enter in the form; documents and eligibility are checked at counselling or admission by the authority running it.

Step by step

Application process and fee

Applications for GPAT 2026 were accepted only online through the NBEMS website, and the GPAT 2026 bulletin allows a single application per candidate; anyone found with more than one may see NBEMS keep only the higher-numbered application ID for the admit card and cancel the others, fees forfeited. The GPAT 2026 application portal asked candidates not to fill the form on a mobile phone.

The bulletin's image instructions require two photographs, one captured in real time through the computer's own webcam or built-in camera while filling the form and one recent photograph no more than 3 months old, plus a signature and a left-thumb impression. After registering for a user ID, the candidate completes the form, uploads the images, chooses a test city, pays through the payment gateway and submits after agreeing to the declaration; the bulletin says to keep a printout showing the payment status as "S".

Gateway charges come on top. The prescribed fee is not refunded or carried forward to a later exam under any circumstances, and absentees and ineligible candidates forfeit it; only an accidental duplicate payment against the same application ID is refunded, after the application window closes, under the bulletin's fee chapter.

Paid applications could be edited from 16 to 19 January 2026, when everything except name, nationality, email ID, mobile number, Aadhaar number and test city could be changed, per the GPAT 2026 bulletin. Moving to a category or PwD status with a higher fee meant paying the difference before that edit window shut. Image defects then got a selective window from 6 to 9 February and a final one from 17 to 19 February 2026, and the bulletin says applications still carrying defective images after that are rejected.

Before the exam

Admit card and exam day

GPAT 2026 admit cards were download-only from 2 March 2026, and the GPAT 2026 bulletin wanted the barcoded card brought as a colour printout; an applicant ruled ineligible before the exam was not issued one. The exam ran in a single session on 7 March 2026: entry and registration opened at 7:00 AM, entry closed at 8:30 AM, and the paper ran from 9:00 AM to 12:00 PM.

The reporting counter closes 30 minutes before the test starts, and the GPAT 2026 bulletin cautions that the counter and the venue's main gate might be some distance apart: reaching the counter late means denial of entry even for a candidate already inside the premises. Along with the admit card, each candidate needs one original, unexpired government photo ID (PAN card, driving licence, voter ID, passport or Aadhaar card with photograph) in the same name as the admit card.

The bulletin ties its recent-photograph rule to exam day: GPAT centres capture fingerprints at registration, take photographs at registration, at every bio-break and during the exam, and verify each face against the photographs uploaded with the application. GPAT centres neither hand out nor allow pens, pencils or rough paper. PwBD candidates planning on a scribe or compensatory time had two steps for GPAT 2026: declare it in the application form and, for a scribe, obtain NBEMS's approval beforehand by raising a query with RPwD Act, 2016 documents on the Communication Web Portal.

Structure

Exam pattern

The GPAT 2026 paper was in English only, each question carried four response options, and the GPAT 2026 bulletin describes its one-mark deduction for a wrong answer as 25% negative marking, with no deduction for an unattempted question. Flagging a GPAT answer for review does not hold it back from scoring: a marked response is scored like any other.

The time-bound sections change how the paper is sat. The bulletin's scheme of examination gives, as its worked example, 5 time-bound sections of 25 questions with 36 minutes each: a candidate cannot move on until the previous section's time is over, cannot go back to review or change answers once that time ends, and the next section opens automatically. A footnote keeps even that split conditional: a paper with a different question count, or one where timed blocks are hard to arrange, can be cut into a different number of them.

What to study

Syllabus

The GPAT 2026 bulletin defines the syllabus as the subject and knowledge areas of "The Bachelor of Pharmacy (B. Pharm.) Course Regulations, 2024" and gives an indicative blueprint of how the questions are spread:

The weighting is uneven: Pharmaceutical Chemistry and Pharmaceutics carry 38 questions each, while Pharmacognosy carries 10. The GPAT 2025 bulletin printed the identical blueprint against the same 2024 regulations. Nothing in the GPAT 2026 bulletin assigns these subject blocks to particular timed sections.

How to prepare

Preparation and books

Nowhere in the GPAT 2026 bulletin is a textbook or reading list named. What NBEMS does provide is a demo test on its website, which the GPAT 2026 bulletin made available tentatively from 24 February 2026 for candidates to familiarise themselves with the computer-based test format.

The bulletin's non-disclosure agreement bears directly on preparation. It prohibits any exam preparation service, coaching institute or individual from providing access to actual GPAT questions or answers, and says a candidate found to have enrolled in or used a programme, service or online forum that distributes GPAT content will have the candidature cancelled and the result nullified.

Where it is held

Exam centres

The GPAT 2026 bulletin numbered its tentative test cities state by state, from Kurnool (Andhra Pradesh) at the head of the list to Siliguri (West Bengal) at its foot, and Maharashtra's run of district towns, Ahilyanagar through Yavatmal, is the longest block in it. Candidates picked a city while applying, saw only cities with testing seats still free, and got them on a first-come, first-served basis; the venue within that city is allotted by NBEMS.

When the preferred state had no seats left, the "OTHERS" option asked NBEMS to try the state of the correspondence address, with the risk of a centre elsewhere in India. A GPAT applicant who skipped that option and took a different city from the list had to take the test in that city, with no later change. Test cities were intimated by email on 24 February 2026, the exact venue appears only on the admit card, NBEMS reserves the right to allot a centre anywhere in the country, and requests to change a city or centre are not entertained.

After the exam

Answer key

Six days after the paper, on 13 March 2026, a GPAT candidate who logged in could set the questions they had faced beside their own recorded responses and NBEMS's provisional keys, as the GPAT 2026 provisional answer key notice announced. Challenges were open from 3 PM on 13 March to 3 PM on 16 March 2026 at a non-refundable Rs 200 per question, and a challenge without a valid explanation or reference was to be discarded.

The GPAT 2026 result notice reports the outcome: 7 questions were found technically incorrect and every candidate who appeared got full marks for them, attempted or not, while the answer key was changed for 4 questions, where marks went only to those who had chosen the correct option. The post-challenge question paper with final keys was to be available in the applicant login on or after 15 April 2026. The note on the GPAT 2026 application portal says it could be viewed only till 20 April 2026.

Earlier NBEMS cycles dropped questions too. The GPAT 2025 result notice records 5 technically incorrect questions and 1 corrected key, and the GPAT 2024 result notice records 3 technically incorrect questions.

Scores

Result and scorecard

NBEMS declared the GPAT 2026 result on 7 April 2026, compiled from the final answer keys on raw marks. Each candidate receives a GPAT score and a GPAT 2026 rank, the overall merit position among everyone who appeared, and the GPAT 2026 bulletin says NBEMS prepares no category-wise or state-wise merit list. There is no re-evaluation, rechecking or re-totalling.

Two GPAT candidates on the same score are ranked by the bulletin's tie-breaking clause: fewer negative responses first, then age (older ranks higher), then Class XII marks, then Class X marks, with CGPA multiplied by 9.5 to give an indicative percentage.

Scorecards showing the GPAT 2026 cut-off score, percentile and rank were due on or after 15 April 2026, and the GPAT 2026 result notice says they stay downloadable for only six months after upload, with no copies sent by email or post. The same notice fixes the validity of the GPAT 2026 score at three years.

Scores you need

Cutoff

GPAT has two qualifying tests and a candidate must pass both, according to the GPAT 2026 bulletin. The first is a percentile floor: the 50th percentile for General and EWS candidates, and the 45th for OBC, SC and ST candidates and for PwBD candidates of any category. The second is a cap: the candidate must fall within 10% of all candidates who appeared, in merit order, with that qualified list split 40.5% UR, 27% OBC, 15% SC, 10% EWS and 7.5% ST, each share including PwBD candidates. Where a category falls short, the bulletin's conversion table moves the unfilled places: the PwBD shares of ST, SC, UR and OBC pass to their parent category, ST places pass to SC, and SC and EWS places pass to UR. A candidate ranked below the last qualified candidate of a category but holding the same score is declared not qualified.

In GPAT 2026 the cap produced a qualified list of 5,362 out of 53,617 who appeared, and the category cut-offs in the GPAT 2026 result notice were:

Of the 5,362 candidates qualified in GPAT 2026, the GPAT 2026 result notice counts 2,308 OBC-NCL, 959 General-EWS, 900 SC, 780 General and 415 ST candidates, with 123 PwBD candidates across them.

The General cut-off has sat near the 96th percentile in each NBEMS cycle. The GPAT 2025 result notice put the UR cut-off at the 96.2390225 percentile and a score of 216, with 4,714 of 47,142 appeared candidates qualified. NBEMS's GPAT 2024 cut-off percentile notice put it at the 96.15414 percentile, with 3,934 candidates qualified.

These are qualifying cut-offs for GPAT itself, not admission cut-offs. Each participating institute releases its own cut-off GPAT score for admission, as the bulletin's counselling chapter states.

Getting a seat

Counselling and seat allotment

GPAT has no counselling round of its own. The GPAT 2026 bulletin says NBEMS has no role in M.Pharm counselling, that admission to PG courses is undertaken by the State Government or state admission committee, and that candidates must apply separately to the participating institutions with their GPAT 2026 score.

Reservation in centrally run institutes follows central norms: 15% of seats for SC, 7.5% for ST, 27% for OBC non-creamy layer on the Central List and 10% for EWS, with 5% in each category for candidates with 40% or more disability. State-run, state-aided and state-recognised pharmacy colleges apply their own state's reservation rules instead. The GPAT 2026 bulletin also warns that the category and PwD status entered on the NBEMS form may not be changed by the counselling authority, which may pre-fill its own registration from the GPAT form and require the same email ID and mobile number.

The stipend is PCI's, not AICTE's. A PCI circular dated 12 November 2024 announcing PMSPPS disbursement names it the Pradhan Mantri Scholarship for Pharmacy Post Graduate Studies (PMSPPS): Rs 12,400 a month, tenable for 24 months, for GPAT-qualified students admitted to PCI-approved postgraduate programmes within PCI-approved intake, paid through Canara Bank, for the 2023-2024 and 2024-2025 academic sessions on results declared by NTA and NBEMS respectively. PCI's circular of 28 October 2025 keeps the same monthly rate, tenure and Canara Bank route for the 2025-2026 session, on results declared by NBEMS, and repeats that only qualified GPAT students are eligible.

Older admissions were added later. A PCI circular of 13 February 2025 made PMSPPS available to students who qualified the GPAT held by AICTE through NTA and took M.Pharm admission in 2022-2023 or 2023-2024 with a valid GPAT score card. For the 2022-2023 group, a PCI update dated 12 May 2026 says payment will follow only after their institutions verify attendance records, and that PCI had their data from NTA but not yet their mobile numbers and email addresses.

Attendance is being tied to the money for current students too. A PCI circular dated 4 May 2026 extended Aadhaar-enabled biometric attendance to every M.Pharm student at PCI-approved institutions, with registration due by 31 May 2026, names validating PMSPPS disbursement as its main purpose, and warns that non-compliance may lead to GPAT scholarships being withheld. The AICTE PG Scholarship notification for 2025-26 does not mention GPAT or M.Pharm at all: it invites proposals for first-year M.E., M.Tech. and M.Des. students holding a valid GATE or CEED score card.

Where it is accepted

Participating institutes

No participating institute is named anywhere in the GPAT 2026 bulletin, which defines them only as the institutions that accept GPAT scores, tells candidates to read each one's admission process on its own website, and says NBEMS does not collect how many seats they hold or which reservation criteria they follow.

The nearest official list is PCI's own. Its Approved institutions for M. Pharm Courses page lists institutions by state with their PCI code, examining authority and PCI decision, the last being the M.Pharm specialisation approved; it records approvals, not which colleges are admitting on GPAT scores in a given year.

Get help

Contact

For the 2026 cycle the GPAT 2026 bulletin named the NBEMS candidate care helpline, +91-7996165333, as the preferred mode, with working days Monday to Friday from 9:30 AM to 6:00 PM except gazetted holidays. Those phone hours applied from the day applications opened, 23 December 2025, to result day, 7 April 2026, and on exam day, 7 March 2026, the line opened early and closed with the paper, 7:00 AM to 12:00 PM.

Queries on application submission, payment and failed-transaction refunds go through the helpdesk inside the applicant login; all other queries go through the NBEMS Communication Web Portal. The GPAT 2026 result notice also gives 011-45593000 for queries. Letters about GPAT are addressed, per the GPAT 2026 bulletin's communication protocols, to the Executive Director of NBEMS at Medical Enclave, Ansari Nagar, New Delhi-110029.

Source

Official links

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Disclaimer

Disclaimer

Conducted by AICTE until 2018, NTA from 2019 to 2023 and NBEMS from 2024. Exact dates, registration windows, cutoffs, answer keys and results are per-cycle. Anything per-cycle here is stated for the cycle it names and is taken from the conducting body's own notification; confirm it on the official website before acting on it. Expertie does not conduct any exam, process applications or charge fees.

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