Every IBPS PO strategy post tells you to focus on "high-yield topics", and most of them prove the claim with a weightage table that names no paper, no shift and no date. That table is worth nothing, because IBPS has never published a topic-wise blueprint and any table built without one is an estimate wearing the costume of data. The thing it is pretending to be, though, is genuinely buildable: your own topic tally, drawn from papers and mocks you can name, read in the way that turns counts into a practice order.
One boundary before you start. IBPS defines the exam pattern (sections, question counts, duration, marks and the penalty for a wrong answer) in the advertisement for each recruitment cycle, published at ibps.in. It does not define anywhere how many questions a section will give to puzzles or to reading comprehension. Every pattern figure here describes recent cycles, and every topic-level statement is a hypothesis your own count either confirms or overturns.
IBPS PO Prelims: the three-section frame
The Preliminary exam tests three sections: English Language, Quantitative Aptitude, and Reasoning Ability. That structure has been stable across cycles, and it is exactly how our IBPS PO Prelims course organises its coverage: section by section, basic to advanced, with previous year questions attached to each topic.
In recent cycles the paper has run as a one-hour, 100-question test with sectional timing (English Language 30 questions, Quantitative Aptitude 35, Reasoning Ability 35), each question carrying one mark, with a penalty for wrong answers. Those three section totals are load-bearing, because they are the figures your own tally has to reconcile against, so take the current cycle's numbers from the advertisement before you build mock strategy on them.
Question count is the weightage, which is why the count has to be yours
Because prelims questions have carried equal marks in recent cycles, question count is weightage. A topic that supplied 15 of the 35 reasoning questions in a paper you attempted was worth roughly 15 marks in that paper. That is the whole reason a topic tally is worth building, and also the reason a borrowed one is worthless: weightage you cannot trace to a named paper and shift is not weightage, it is somebody's impression.
It is also why most published weightage tables fail the simplest test you can apply to them. Add up their topic ranges and the section frequently comes to far more questions than the section actually contains. A tally you build yourself cannot do that, because the paper in front of you has a fixed number of questions and every one of them gets counted exactly once.
Build the tally: one column per shift, one label per question
Open a spreadsheet. Give every shift you analyse its own column (a previous year paper you have the full question set for, or a full-length mock you actually attempted), and every topic label its own row. Then tag each question in that shift with exactly one label and add the counts down the column.
Five rules keep the sheet honest:
One label per question, chosen by what the question tests rather than by what it mentions. A percentage calculation sitting inside a data interpretation set is a DI question, because that is where its reading time went.
Keep the labels fixed. Use the same row names for every shift. A topic that changes name between columns cannot be compared across them.
Every column must total its section's question count. If your reasoning column adds up to 39 against a 35-question section, you have double-counted, usually a puzzle set tagged both as its own row and inside a broader one. Fix the column before you read anything into it.
Never merge shifts into a single total. Shifts differ, and the spread between them is information. Averaging it away is how an honest count turns into false precision.
Date every column and record where the paper came from. A count you cannot attribute is exactly the anonymous table you set out to replace.
Use these as your starting rows. They are the standard topic families the paper draws on, a vocabulary for tagging rather than a claim about how many questions each one receives:
Section | Topic labels to tag with |
|---|---|
English Language | Reading comprehension; cloze test; error spotting and sentence improvement; para jumbles; fillers and vocabulary; other grammar sets |
Quantitative Aptitude | Data interpretation (one row per set); simplification and approximation; arithmetic word problems; number series; quadratic comparisons |
Reasoning Ability | Puzzles and seating arrangement; inequalities; syllogism; blood relations; series, direction and order; other single questions |
Two or three focused evenings across four or five shifts is enough to see a shape. The tagging itself repays the time: labelling a question forces you to name what it tests, which is the same judgement that decides, in the exam hall, whether you attempt it or skip it.
What your tally will probably show, and what to do about it
Three families are widely expected to anchor the prelims paper: puzzles and seating arrangement in reasoning, data interpretation in quantitative aptitude, and reading comprehension with cloze in English. Treat that as the hypothesis your sheet is testing, not as a finding you can quote at anyone.
Reading comprehension usually arrives as a single passage, so the English section tends to reward reading speed and vocabulary in context at least as much as grammar-rule recall. Check whether your English columns agree before you rebalance your grammar work.
Data interpretation arrives in sets (several questions built on one data table), so a single set moves your count by a block rather than by one. Arithmetic (percentages, ratio, profit and loss, time and work, speed and distance) both stands alone and hides inside those sets, which is why arithmetic fundamentals pay twice however your columns split.
Reasoning is usually the most lopsided of the three, with puzzles and seating arrangement taking the largest single share. If your own count agrees, the practical reading is blunt: an aspirant who cannot start a floor-based or box-based puzzle within thirty seconds is conceding the biggest block in the paper.
The corollary matters just as much: no small topic deserves panic. Syllogism, blood relations and quadratic comparisons are each a small pocket with one standard method. Learn the method, bank those marks in under a minute each, and spend the saved anxiety on puzzles and DI. The topic-wise question banks inside our Banking & Insurance courses are organised for exactly this kind of targeted practice.
IBPS PO Mains: how the topic mix shifts
The Mains paper regroups the same skills under heavier sections: Reasoning and Computer Aptitude, English Language, Data Analysis and Interpretation, and General/Economy/Banking Awareness, plus a descriptive English test. Section-level marks and timing change from cycle to cycle, so take them from the advertisement. Run the same one-column-per-paper tally on Mains material, and watch for three shifts against your prelims sheet:
Data Analysis and Interpretation is DI nearly wall to wall. The standalone arithmetic of prelims largely dissolves into caselets and data sets. If your DI is prelims-passable but not strong, Mains exposes it.
Reasoning and Computer Aptitude is puzzle-dominated. Computer aptitude has generally appeared as a small block rather than a section of its own, often folded into reasoning-style questions; your Mains columns will show you how small. Preparing a full computer-science syllabus for it is a weightage mistake.
General/Economy/Banking Awareness is the one genuinely new preparation area. It rewards a daily current-affairs habit sustained over weeks, and no amount of prelims practice substitutes for it.
The IBPS PO Mains course follows that order: DI and puzzle depth first, banking awareness as a running track, and descriptive writing as a practised skill rather than an afterthought.
Turning the tally into a preparation plan
A tally answers "what do I practise most". It does not answer "how do I sequence prelims and mains in the same calendar". For that split, read our guide on how to divide Bank PO preparation between Prelims and Mains, which builds the phase plan this counting feeds into.
Review the sheet at the end of each month rather than after every mock. Look for topics that hold a large share in most of your columns, not for the one that spiked in a single shift, then re-weight the coming month's practice accordingly. The working rule most tallies end up supporting: make puzzles, DI and reading comprehension daily non-negotiables from week one, because they carry weight at both stages; keep the small topics on a weekly rotation; and start banking awareness the same month you start prelims prep, not after the prelims result.
The short version, and your next step
There is no official IBPS topic-wise weightage, so build the only version worth trusting: one column per shift, one label per question, every column totalling its section's question count, with sources and dates recorded. Confirm the current exam pattern in the advertisement at ibps.in, then weight your practice hours the way your own sheet weights the questions.
If you want a study path already built around the same three sections, the IBPS PO Prelims course covers all of them with topic-wise PYQs and an AI roadmap that tracks section-wise progress, and the IBPS PO bundle carries the same system through Mains. Ten honest weeks on the topics your own count puts at the top beat six months of undifferentiated grinding.
