UPSC Prelims

What is the UPSC Syllabus? 

The official notification for UPSC exam 2025 will be released on 22nd January 2025, hence, it is important for candidates to go through the latest UPSC 2025 syllabus provided along with it.

The UPSC syllabus has been clearly defined for Prelims and Mains which will help you get an overview and have better understanding of the exam’s nature. 

To begin with, there are 3 stages in the UPSC Civil service examination which are as follows: 

• UPSC Prelims: The first stage of the UPSC exam cycle is the Preliminary exam. There are 2 papers, each containing a total of 100 and 80 objective–based questions respectively.  
• UPSC Mains: The second stage is the Mains exam. There are a total of 9 papers and the exam is descriptive in nature.   
• Personality Test: The final round is the Personal Interview is held to assess the personality of the candidate.   

If you want to know more details regarding UPSC Syllabus 2025 without having to read the entire article, I have prepared a pdf for you on the same, which contains in-depth information regarding the IAS syllabus for prelims, mains and interview.    

You can download this UPSC Syllabus pdf by just clicking on this button below.   

Before we proceed to the next section, you can click on the latest eligibility criteria for UPSC exam to check the qualifications required for appearing in this exam.  

UPSC Prelims Syllabus 

The UPSC Prelims consists of two papers – GS Paper 1 and CSAT. It is important to note that the Prelims exam is qualifying in nature.

The syllabus of UPSC Prelims contains both static portion and current affairs.  

1. The General Studies (GS) consists of social science subjects like:
   • History
   • Polity
   • Geography
   • Indian economy.  
2. The Civil Services Aptitude Test (CSAT) comprises of questions asked from topics like:
   • Quantitative Aptitude
   • Reasoning Ability
   • English Comprehension.  

An important point to note here is that a negative marking of 1/3rd is allotted for wrong answers in both the papers – GS Paper 1 and CSAT. 

While the minimum marks required by the candidates to clear GS Paper is decided by the cutoff released by the UPSC.

For CSAT, the candidates required to score only 33% or 66 marks out of 200 marks to clear the paper.  

Since Prelims is qualifying in nature, the marks scored in both papers will not be considered in your final order of merit, helping you ace the interview round.    

If you want to know about the time limit and total marks in detail, you can go through the UPSC Prelims exam pattern   

UPSC Prelims Syllabus for Paper 1: General Studies (GS)

This GS paper or paper 1 is designed to test your overall knowledge and awareness. The syllabus for GS Paper comprises both static and dynamic portion.  

The UPSC prelims syllabus 2025 for the GS paper consist of topics from a wide range of subjects such as Polity, Geography, History, Economy, Science and Tech, Environment. 

Now, I have written down the list of major topics from the UPSC Prelims syllabus which broadly cover for GS Paper (Paper 1) below: 

• Current eventsof national and international importance
• Historyof India and Indian National Movement
• Indian & World Geography– Social, Physical, Economic Geography of the World and India.
• Governance and Polity in India– Rights Issues, Constitution, Public Policy, Political System, Panchayati Raj, etc.
• Social & Economic Development– Social Sector initiatives, Demographics, Sustainable Development, Inclusion, Poverty, etc.
• General issues on Biodiversity, Environmental Ecology, & Climate Change– these topics do not require subject specialization.
• General Science

Now, if you are wondering where to cover all these topics from, read the blog that I have written on best books for UPSC CSE preparation. 

UPSC Prelims Syllabus for Paper 2: Civil Services Aptitude Test (CSAT)

The syllabus for CSAT paper includes questions from the subjects like Reasoning & Analysis, Quantitative Aptitude and Reading Comprehension.  

It is conducted to test your reasoning, comprehension, analytical abilities and decision – making skills of the candidates.

Here is the list of major topics of the UPSC syllabus 2025 from which questions are asked in the CSAT Paper: 

• Comprehension
• Communication and Interpersonal Skills
• Analytical ability and Logical Thinking
• Problem Solving and Decision Making
• General Mental Ability
• Basic Numeracy, i.e. orders of magnitudes, numbers & their relations, etc (class 10 level)
• Interpretation of Data (charts, tables, graphs, data sufficiency, etc. – Also class 10 level)

To effectively prepare your best for the UPSC exam, you can refer to the UPSC preparation strategy & study plan. 

So, this pretty much sums up the IAS syllabus 2025 for the Prelims exam. Now it’s time to discuss the UPSC Mains syllabus in detail.