> ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.upscyatra.in/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # UPSC CSAT PYQs: Practice Paper II Questions by Year > Practice official UPSC CSAT Paper II questions from past years. Improve comprehension speed, reasoning, and data interpretation to clear the 33% cutoff. CSAT is the exam that doesn't count — until it eliminates you. Paper II (CSAT) is qualifying in nature, meaning your marks don't contribute to your Prelims score or merit ranking. But failing to clear 33% means your GS Paper I marks become irrelevant, no matter how well you performed. Every year, candidates who scored 120+ on GS Paper I have been knocked out of the Prelims shortlist because they underestimated Paper II. UPSCYatra's CSAT PYQ section gives you past year questions organised by year so you can practise with real exam material, benchmark your performance, and fix gaps before they cost you a Prelims attempt. ## What's Available UPSCYatra hosts **617+ UPSC Prelims CSAT (Paper II) questions** spanning **8 years** — from **2019 to 2026**. Questions from **2022–2026 are free** without logging in. The complete archive from **2019–2021** is available with a **free login**. Each year's questions are presented in full so you can practise them as a complete paper or filter by topic type. ## Topics Covered in CSAT PYQs UPSC Paper II tests a specific set of aptitude skills. You'll find questions from all of these areas across the available years: Reading passages followed by inference, summary, and tone questions. Speed and accuracy in parsing dense text is the key skill here. Syllogisms, logical sequences, statement-assumption, statement-conclusion, and cause-effect questions. Series completion, analogies, coding-decoding, blood relations, direction sense, and spatial reasoning. Number systems, percentages, ratio and proportion, averages, simple and compound interest, and profit & loss. Class 10-level mathematics. Bar charts, pie charts, line graphs, and tables. Questions test your ability to read, interpret, and calculate from structured data quickly. ## Strategy for Clearing CSAT The goal is not to maximise your CSAT score — it's to clear the 33% threshold reliably, then invest the rest of your preparation bandwidth in GS Paper I. You need **33% to qualify** — that's **67 marks out of 200**. With 80 questions of 2.5 marks each and a 1/3 negative marking, you can qualify by answering approximately **34–36 questions correctly** while attempting carefully. Do not try to attempt all 80 questions. Attempt one full year's paper (use 2023 or 2024) under timed conditions — 80 questions in 120 minutes. Score yourself honestly. This benchmark tells you exactly how much work CSAT needs. Most candidates are weak in either **comprehension speed** or **numeracy/DI**. Check where you lost the most marks in your benchmark attempt and focus your practice on that area first. Practise by topic type using the filters in the CSAT PYQ section — spend focused sessions on comprehension one day, DI the next. Varied, short practice sessions build speed more effectively than marathon attempts. In the 4–6 weeks before Prelims, take at least two complete timed CSAT papers. Confirm that you can consistently clear 33% with an appropriate attempt strategy and comfortable margin. ## Background-Based Time Estimates Most quantitative-background candidates can clear the 33% threshold with **2–3 weeks of focused practice**, primarily on comprehension speed and logical reasoning. Your numeracy and DI instincts are already strong; the unfamiliar question formats are the only real hurdle. Plan for **4–6 weeks of dedicated CSAT preparation**, with emphasis on basic numeracy and data interpretation. These topics require building comfort with numbers from scratch, which takes more time — but with consistent practice, the 33% target is very achievable. ## Free vs. Login Access | Access Level | Questions Available | | --------------------- | ------------------------------------------------- | | No account (browsing) | 2022–2026 CSAT papers (5 full papers) | | Free account (login) | Full archive: 2019–2026 (617+ questions, 8 years) | Creating an account is free and takes under a minute. [Sign up here →](/getting-started) Do not leave CSAT entirely to the last two weeks of Prelims preparation. It has eliminated strong GS candidates in multiple recent cycles. Treat CSAT as a risk to be managed early: spend a few weeks on it at the start of your preparation year, clear the threshold comfortably in mock tests, and then maintain that level with occasional practice through the year. On comprehension passages, read the **questions first**, then the passage. This tells you exactly what to look for and dramatically reduces the time you spend re-reading. For DI, practise approximation techniques — precise calculations waste time; close approximations are usually enough to distinguish the right answer from the distractors.