Free reasoning practice for bank exams, puzzles included

Reasoning has two halves: sets and singles

SBI Clerk Prelims has 35 Reasoning questions in 20 minutes. They fall into two very different groups:

A good reasoning score usually comes from clearing nearly all the singles accurately, then solving as many sets as time allows.

All 17 topics, grouped

• Sets: puzzles, seating arrangement, input-output
• Rule-based singles: syllogism, inequality, coded inequality, alphanumeric series, alphabet test, pair formation, meaningful words, odd one out
• Logic singles: blood relations, direction and distance, order and ranking, coding-decoding
• Mains extras: data sufficiency (reasoning) and logical reasoning (statements, assumptions, conclusions)

Topics with generated questions: inequality, coded inequality, syllogism, alphanumeric series, coding-decoding, direction, ranking, pair formation and alphabet test.

Three quick examples with solutions

Syllogism

Statements: All pens are books. Some books are bags. Conclusion: Some pens are bags.

Does not follow. The books that are bags may not include any pens. Draw it: a pen circle inside a book circle, and a bag circle overlapping only the part of books outside pens. Both statements stay true, and the conclusion fails.

Coding-decoding

If COLD is written as DPME, how is WARM written?

Each letter moves one step forward: C→D, O→P, L→M, D→E. So WARM becomes XBSN.

Direction

Ravi walks 5 km north, turns right and walks 3 km, then turns right and walks 9 km. How far is he from the start?

After the second right turn he is facing south. Net: 9 − 5 = 4 km south and 3 km east. Distance = √(16 + 9) = 5 km, towards the south-east.

How to approach puzzles in practice

Puzzles are where most candidates lose time. Practise them in this way:

1. Untimed at first, until you can solve a set of about five people or items without mistakes.
2. Then timed at six minutes per set, including the questions.
3. Then in sectional mocks, where you also have to decide which set to skip.

Our separate page on seating arrangement notes and the puzzle FAQ, how to solve puzzles faster, go into the method in detail.

A daily reasoning routine

• 15 minutes: one generated topic, such as inequality or syllogism, 20 questions.
• 30 minutes: two puzzle or seating sets, with full review of any mistake.
• 10 minutes: one logic topic, such as blood relations or direction.

Where marks leak in the short topics

• Inequality: getting the strength of the conclusion wrong. From A ≥ B ≥ C you can only say A ≥ C, so "A > C" does not follow. From A > B ≥ C, "A > C" does follow, because one strict sign in the chain is enough.
• Syllogism: forgetting the "either-or" case. When two conclusions are about the same pair and neither is definite, check whether one of them must be true.
• Blood relations: assuming gender from a name. Unless the question says so, "P is the child of Q" tells you nothing about whether P is a son or daughter.
• Direction: mixing up left and right after a turn. Draw the arrow every time; it takes two seconds.
• Alphanumeric series: counting from the wrong end. Underline "from the left" or "from the right" in the question before counting.

Each of these is a habit, not a knowledge gap. They show up clearly in your mistake book, so check it weekly and look for repeats.

What changes in Mains

In SBI Clerk Mains, reasoning shares a 45-minute section with computer aptitude: 50 questions for 60 marks. Puzzles get bigger, with more variables and more conditions, and data sufficiency and logical reasoning appear. Practise the Mains topics once your Prelims singles are steady, and take Mains sectional mocks to get used to the combined section.

Questions people ask