National Aptitude Test in Architecture (NATA)

National Aptitude Test in Architecture (NATA) is a national level undergraduate exam which is conducted by Council of Architecture (COA) for admission to 5-year B.Arch programme. Through NATA 2019, candidates can get admission into B.Arch programme offered by Government, Government-aided, Private Unaided, University Departments and Deemed Universities of the country. Previously NATA was conducted once every year, but from 2019, the exam was conducted twice a year - first on April 14, 2019 and the second on July 7, 2019. The admit card of NATA 2019 for the first attempt was released on April 1 around 6:00 PM. The admit card for July attempt has been released on June 26. Result for April attempt was declared on May 3 while for July attempt, it was declared on July 18. Candidates can appear in one or both the attempts of NATA 2019. If the candidate appears in both attempts, then best of the two scores will be considered. The eligibility criteria of NATA 2019 has also been changed, with diploma candidates currently no longer eligible for admission. That is not all as there are plans to make changes to the exam pattern and counselling process as well. The question paper of the exam has two parts- Part A containing Multiple Choice Questions (MCQs) was conducted online, while Part B (Drawing test) was held in offline mode. 

Candidates appearing for the entrance exam need to meet the below mentioned eligibility criteria of NATA prescribed by the authorities. The eligibility criteria includes the parameters like  qualifying examination, minimum marks required, age limit etc:

NATA 2019 Eligibility Criteria

Qualifying Examination: Candidate must have passed 10+2 or equivalent examination.

Please note that from the academic session 2019-20, Diploma holders are no longer eligible for admission to architecture program.

Qualifying Marks: Candidate must have obtained a minimum of 50% marks in mathematics, physics, and chemistry taken together. Additionally, the candidate needs to score minimum 50% marks in aggregate in 10+2.

Age limit: Minimum 17 years of age as on July 31, 2019

Mode of Application : Online

Mode of Payment : Net Banking | Credit Card | Debit Card

NATA 2019 application form  is available in online mode. Mentioned below are the steps to be followed to fill and submit the application form of NATA: 

NATA 2019 Application Form- Steps to Follow

Step 1 – Register- To fill the application form of NATA 2019, first register by submitting details like name, mobile number, date of birth, and valid email id. Also, choose a username and create a password for future log-ins.    

Step 2 – Login to fill the application form : Use the username and password to log-in and enter all the requisite details like personal, communication, and academic information. Also, choose three exam centres in order of preference.  

Step 3 – Upload Scanned Images of     Documents: In the prescribed format by the authorities,     candidates will have to upload scanned images of their photograph,     signature and community certificate (if applicable).    

Documents Specifications                                                                                                                                                                            

Step 4 – Generation of Application Number- Once uploading of documents is done, candidates will have to submit the application form. On submission of NATA 2019 application form,an 8-digit application number will be generated.

Step 5 – Pay Application  Fee: Prescribed application fee need to be paid in online mode (credit/debit card, or net banking).   

Step 6 – Take a Print out of Confirmation page: Once all the above-mentioned steps are completed, the application confirmation page will be displayed. Download this the confirmation page and take a printout of it for future reference.

Application Fees

NATA exam pattern will enable candidates to know about the marking scheme, duration of examination, type of questions asked, mode of exam and more. For the current academic session, the council plans to make some changes to the exam pattern of NATA, for example the time duration of drawing section could be increased from present 90 to 120 minutes, while reducing allotted time of aptitude and mathematics test from 90 to 60 minutes.

Given below is the exam pattern of NATA based on previous session.

NATA 2019 Exam Pattern

NATA question paper will be divided into two part- Part A and B

Questions Type/Mode of Examination: 

• Part A will carry Multiple Choice Questions (MCQs) which candidates need to answer in online mode. 
• Part B will carry subjective type questions that need to be answered in offline mode on the A4 drawing sheet.

Number of Questions in Each Part: 

• Part A will have 20 questions from Mathematics and 40 from General Aptitude sections
• Part B will carry two questions. These will be Drawing-based questions.

Exam Duration: 3 hours will be allotted to complete the examination  out of which the Maths and General Aptitude test will be for 60 minutes while the drawing test will be for 120 minutes.

Marking scheme: In part A, 2 marks will be awarded for every correct response. While in Part B, each carries 40 marks. There is no negative marking.

Before the actual exam takes place, NATA 2019 mock test will be provided to the candidates by the authorities. The mock test will be a replica of actual examination. Attempting NATA mock test will help candidates to get familiar with the functionalities of the online exam, type of questions that may be asked and more. 

Admit card for July attempt has been released on June 26 in online mode. Candidates can download their NATA 2019 admit card from official portal.Admit card for April attempt was released on April 1. To download the admit card, candidates had to log-in to their account using their application number and date of birth. It carries information like the name of the candidate, address of the exam centre, admit card number etc. NATA admit card 2019 is an important document. Candidates who failed to carry it to the examination centre were not allowed to appear for the entrance exam. Also, after the completion of the entrance exam, admit card need to kept safely till the admission process ends.

COA has announced the NATA 2019 result in online mode on May 3 for the April attempt. The July attempt result was declared on July 18. The result score of candidates and carries overall qualifying cutoff along with the subject-wise minimum marks for qualification. To check the result candidates will have to log-in to their portal using their applications sequence number and date password. The result can be downloaded in the form of NATA 2019 score card which carry details like paper-wise marks obtained by the candidate, total marks, and also the qualifying status. Apart from this, it will also carry details like candidate’s name, gender, DOB, category, application and roll number.

COA prescribes minimum part-wise and overall NATA 2019 minimum marks one needs to score to qualify the entrance exam. The cutoff of NATA for both Part A and Part B are declared before the exam. However, the overall cutoff is decided based on post-exam statistics. 

Its important for candidates to meet NATA 2019 cutoff for all 3 conditions individually to qualify in the exam.

NATA Qualifying Cut off 

Until last academic session there was no common counselling for NATA 2019. COA only conducted the entrance exam. The universities/colleges and states offering B.Arch programmes conducted their own separate counselling based on scores obtained in NATA 2019. Once the result is announced by the authorities, the institutes conduct their separate counselling. However, starting from this academic session there are plans to conduct national-level centralized counselling for NATA. This is to ensure candidates don't have to travel from one college to another, which can be very taxiing and time consuming. Also, common counselling for NATA 2019 will also ensure that seats don't go vacant.

Candidates however still to meet the eligibility criteria of the university/college to which they are applying. There are more than 400 institutes that accept NATA scores. Based on the NATA scores and choices opted, allotment of seats will be made.