The one thing to know
The Agniveervayu online test is not a single paper with a single clock. Each subject is timed separately. When a subject's time runs out, that section submits itself automatically.
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If you take nothing else from this article, take that. It changes how a candidate should practise, and it makes a large part of the standard advice about attempting a paper actively harmful here.
How the sitting is structured
Under the candidate instructions published for the 01/2025 Agniveervayu examination:
- The candidate begins a subject's section by clicking a control to start it.
- When that subject's time elapses, the section submits automatically and the next one becomes available.
- The submit control is disabled for the first five minutes of each section.
So a candidate moves through the subjects in sequence, and each transition is one-way.
The three streams and their sections
Under the same candidate instructions, the paper depends on the side a candidate has applied on.
Science only — sixty minutes
Under the candidate instructions for the 01/2025 Agniveervayu examination:
- Physics — questions 1 to 25, 25 marks, 20 minutes.
- Mathematics — questions 26 to 50, 25 marks, 20 minutes.
- English — questions 51 to 70, 20 marks, 20 minutes.
Other than science — forty-five minutes
Under the candidate instructions for the 01/2025 Agniveervayu examination:
- English — questions 1 to 20, 20 marks, 20 minutes.
- RAGA — questions 21 to 50, 30 marks, 25 minutes.
Both — eighty-five minutes
Under the candidate instructions for the 01/2025 Agniveervayu examination:
- Physics — questions 1 to 25, 25 marks, 20 minutes.
- Mathematics — questions 26 to 50, 25 marks, 20 minutes.
- English — questions 51 to 70, 20 marks, 20 minutes.
- RAGA — questions 71 to 100, 30 marks, 25 minutes.
RAGA is Reasoning and General Awareness. The standard throughout is 10+2 under the CBSE syllabus.
Why the per-section clock changes your preparation
Most exam-timing advice assumes one clock over one paper. Under one clock, the correct strategy is to sweep the paper, bank time on the questions you can do quickly, and spend it on the hard ones at the end.
Under a per-section clock, none of that transfers.
- Time saved in Physics stays in Physics. It does not become Mathematics time.
- A section you found easy does not subsidise a section you found hard.
- There is no "come back to it at the end", because the end of a section is the end of that subject.
- A candidate who is still reading question 24 when the Physics clock runs out has had question 25 submitted blank, and cannot return to it.
The habit to build instead is a per-subject pace. Under the 01/2025 instructions, twenty minutes for twenty-five Physics questions is under fifty seconds a question, and twenty-five minutes for thirty RAGA questions is about the same. Practise in blocks of that shape, against a clock, from the beginning. A ninety-minute mixed practice session does not build the habit this exam tests.
Marking
Under the Agniveervayu advertisement for the 01/2027 cycle:
- One mark for a correct answer.
- Nil for an unattempted question.
- Zero point two five deducted for a wrong answer.
A wrong answer costs, and an unanswered one does not. That is a meaningful difference from the Army's current position and it should change how a candidate treats a question they cannot narrow down. We are not going to give you a guessing rule, because the right one depends on how far you can narrow an option set and that is personal. What we will say is that the arithmetic is worth doing for yourself before the day.
Language
Under the same advertisement, the test is objective and the questions are bilingual in English and Hindi, except for the English paper.
That exception is in the Agniveervayu advertisement for the 01/2027 cycle itself. Its practical effect is that a candidate relying on the Hindi rendering has no Hindi rendering of one entire section, and that section is 20 marks in every stream.
Qualifying
Under the same advertisement, candidates must qualify in each paper individually, in the science subjects and in the other-than-science subjects, with normalised marks.
So a section can end an attempt on its own, whatever the total. And because the marks are normalised across sittings, no practice score is comparable to the number the recruiting authority works with. We report raw scores and say that is what they are. A platform that gives you a predicted qualifying score is giving you a guess dressed as a measurement.
What to do
- Confirm your stream first — science and other-than-science share only English.
- Practise against a per-subject clock, in blocks the length of the real sections.
- Do not build a "leave it and come back" habit — there is nowhere to come back from.
- Do the guessing arithmetic yourself, from the marking clause of the advertisement you are sitting under.
- Read the current advertisement on the CASB portal — the structure here is read from one cycle and the marking from another, and both move.
Related reading
- The Agniveervayu Syllabus — What Is Published, and What Is Only a Standard
- Marking Across the Three Services — and the Year the Army Withdrew Its Deduction
- The Physical Tests by Service — What Is Published, and What Is Not
This article is general guidance written from publicly available recruitment notifications and scheme documents issued by the Indian Army, the Indian Navy, the Indian Air Force and the Ministry of Defence. Eligibility, exam patterns, physical standards, pay and scheme terms are revised with each recruitment cycle, and every figure stated here is pinned to the cycle it was read from. Always confirm current specifics against the live notification on the official portal of the service you are applying to. VSVSV is a private learning platform. It is not affiliated with, authorised by, or endorsed by the Ministry of Defence, the Indian Armed Forces, or any recruiting body. It takes no part in recruitment or selection.