Getting Started with Arun Sharma's Quantitative Aptitude Book
I've seen this book referenced everywhere for cat and xat preparation. The question usually comes down to how people find the pdf and actually use it without wasting months on bad study habits. Here's what actually works. The latest edition covers around 25 chapters split into three levels of difficulty. Level 1 is basic concept building. Level 2 is standard problem solving. Level 3 is what the actual exam throws at you. Most people skip straight to level 3 and get crushed because their foundation is weak. I made that mistake in 2019 and ended up scoring below percentile in quant on my first attempt. The fix was going back to level 1 and actually solving every single example before moving on. You can find the pdf on various torrent and document sharing sites. Search for the combination of the title plus "latest edition" and "pdf". The 7th edition is the most widely circulated one. Make sure you get the version with OCR text search enabled. Nothing kills momentum faster than trying to read a scanned image that has fuzzy digits. If the pdf doesn't have selectable text, find another source.
One specific issue I ran into multiple times involved the answers section at the back. Some printings have incorrect answer keys for level 3 problems in the permutation and combination chapter. I spent about two hours stuck on question 47 in that section because the official answer was wrong. The workaround was to check online forums where people cross-verify solutions. CATprep forum and Reddit's r/mba community both had threads listing errata for the 7th edition. Always cross-reference your answers. Don't trust the back of the book blindly. Here's something most people miss about this book. The real value isn't in reading the theory sections. It's in the variety of approaches shown for each problem type. Sharma presents multiple methods to solve the same question. You don't need to learn all of them. Pick the one that clicks for you and drill it until it's automatic. Trying to memorize five different shortcut methods for time speed and distance problems just creates confusion during the exam. I saw people do this constantly. They'd freeze mid-question trying to remember which formula applied to which scenario. Another counter-intuitive thing about this material. The chapter on numbers and modern maths carries far more weight than students expect. Modern maths alone covers LCM, HCF, remainders, factorials, and binary numbers. For competitive exams these topics consistently contribute 8 to 12 questions. Yet most preparation guides barely touch them. Sharma dedicates real space here and it shows up in actual test results.
The biggest limitation of this book is that it assumes a baseline mathematical maturity. If you haven't solved algebra problems since school, the early chapters will feel dense and slow. I'd recommend pairing it with a simpler resource like RS Aggarwal for the first pass through basics. Once you're comfortable with high school level math, Sharma becomes genuinely useful. Using it as a first exposure to quant concepts is like trying to run before you can walk properly. There's also the issue of volume. The complete book contains over 1700 problems across all three levels. Working through everything takes roughly 3 to 4 months of dedicated practice at about 3 hours per day. Most exam candidates have 6 to 8 weeks. The smart move is to selectively target chapters based on past exam trends. Geometry and DI usually demand the most practice time. Time speed distance and profit loss are quicker to master and offer better return on investment. If you're looking for the pdf specifically, the search itself is straightforward but quality varies. Older pirated copies sometimes have missing pages in the middle chapters. The DI section in particular tends to get cut or poorly rendered. Before you commit to studying from any downloaded version, open the probability chapter and the set theory chapter. If those look complete and readable, the rest is likely fine too. If not, try another source.
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The book also includes previous year questions from various exams. These are useful but not always properly categorized by difficulty. I found that some questions marked as level 1 were actually harder than certain level 3 problems. Don't let the labeling dictate your study order. Judge each problem on its own merit. If a level 1 question takes you more than 5 minutes on the first attempt, it belongs in your practice rotation regardless of what the book says. For anyone serious about building quant skills from this material, the workflow that works is simple. Read the concept summary in about 15 minutes. Solve all level 1 problems without looking at solutions. Then check your answers and note every mistake. Those mistakes define your study plan for the next week. Level 2 problems come after you've cleared level 1 with over 80 percent accuracy. Level 3 is purely for timed practice sessions closer to the exam date.
