NDA Guides
NDA strategy guides
One guide per NDA subject, ten in all, each built from that subject's own past papers since 2017.
Paper II · General Ability
Vocabulary and idioms you recall, grammar you rule-check, comprehension you reason through. Sixteen playbooks split along those lines, and a word-family list mined from the 270 words NDA has actually tested.
- Recall (Vocab + Idioms) / Rule (Grammar + Errors) / Reason (RC + Cloze + PQRS + FIB) strategy
- 16 chapter-and-subtopic playbooks with worked PYQs
- Vocabulary word families mined from 270 PYQ-tested words
- Trends: Grammar exploded post-2024, Spotting Errors went quiet
2017–2026 · 10 years
Physics is the one NDA subject that has genuinely got harder: 2% of questions were HARD in 2021, 37% by 2026. The strands and the drill posture here are built around that, not around syllabus order.
- Recall (Sound + Modern + Astronomy) / Apply (Light + Mechanics + Gravity) / Reason (E&M + Heat + Fluids) strands
- 14 chapter playbooks — one per chapter with worked PYQs
- 32-formula single-page revision compendium
- Trends: paper hardened sharply 2021→2026 (2% → 37% HARD)
2017–2026 · 19 papers
Rivers to states, peaks to ranges, crops to producer states. Sixty-two such pairings carry most of the marks, and the seven playbooks tell you which of them a given paper is likely to reach for.
- Recall (Indian Geography Economy + Indian Geography Physical + World/Human) / Apply (Climatology + Earth's Structure) / Verify (Earth in Space + Oceanography) strands
- 7 chapter playbooks — one per chapter with worked PYQs
- 62-fact reference (Indian rivers ↔ states, mountain peaks ↔ ranges, mineral/crop ↔ producer states, local winds ↔ regions)
- Trends: paper has NOT consistently hardened — drill all 10 years equally
2017–2026 · 19 papers
Mostly recall, and unlike Physics it has not hardened at all, so a 2017 paper is worth as much as a 2026 one. The core of the guide is a fifty-compound name/formula/use reference in six themed clusters.
- Recall (Carbon + Matter + Industrial + Metals + Hydrogen + Everyday) / Rule (Atomic Structure + Acids/Bases + Reactions + Bonding) / Calculate (Mole) strands
- 12 chapter playbooks — one per chapter with worked PYQs
- 50-compound name↔formula↔use reference in 6 themed clusters
- Trends: paper has NOT hardened (UNLIKE Physics) — drill all 10 years equally
2017–2026 · 19 papers
Modern India alone is 47% of everything NDA has asked. That single fact sets the structure: one cornerstone chapter, two you learn for recall, one quick win, and a ninety-five-entry timeline underneath all four.
- Cornerstone (Modern India alone — 47% of bank) / Foundation Recall (Ancient + Medieval India) / Quick-Win (World History) tier-strands
- 4 chapter playbooks — one per chapter with worked PYQs
- ~95-entry timeline + named pairs (Era timeline, Rulers ↔ dynasty, Reformers ↔ movement, Scholars ↔ texts, British Acts ↔ year)
- Trends: paper has NOT consistently hardened, but chapter mix shifted (Modern dominated 2017–20, Ancient surged 2022–24)
2017–2026 · 19 papers
Four questions in ten years have been rated HARD. Biology is 82% straight recall, so this guide is mostly a fifty-fact reference: diseases to pathogens, vitamins to deficiencies, hormones to glands.
- Recall (Human Physiology + Cell Biology + Microbiology + Biodiversity + Genetics) / Apply (Plant Biology + Reproduction) / Verify (Ecology + Biochemistry) strands
- 9 chapter playbooks — one per chapter with worked PYQs
- 50-fact reference (diseases ↔ pathogens, vitamins ↔ deficiencies, hormones ↔ glands, scientists ↔ discoveries)
- Trends: paper has NOT hardened — only 4 HARDs across 199 q over 10 years
2017–2026 · 19 papers
Ninety per cent of these questions are about something that happened within a year of the paper, which means the facts expire and the shapes don't. So this page teaches the eight themes NDA keeps returning to, with a checklist for each, and sends you elsewhere for this year's facts.
- Single-page Template D — theme-prep-checklist for a short-half-life subject
- 8 anchor themes (5+ year recurrence) + 16 recurring + 7 occasional
- Drill the bank for SHAPE; harvest THIS YEAR's facts from an external compendium
- ~10 q/paper · ~40 marks max · target ~24 marks at 80% on 7 attempts
2017–2026 · 19 papers
Small subject, sharply split. Government Structure is 40% of the bank and worth learning properly; World Polity is 42% HARD and worth a decision about whether you attempt it at all. Roughly eighty Articles, Amendments and Bodies sit behind both.
- Cornerstone (Government Structure — 40% of bank) / Foundation Recall (Indian Constitution + FR/DPSP) / Specialist Wildcard (World Polity — 42% HARD) tier-strands
- 4 chapter playbooks — one per chapter with worked PYQs
- ~80-entry reference (Key Articles ↔ subject, Constitutional Amendments ↔ year ↔ theme, Constitutional Bodies ↔ function ↔ Article, Parts ↔ Schedules ↔ content)
- Trends: paper has NOT consistently hardened, but the completed 2026 pair is the hardest year on record (37%)
2017–2026 · 19 papers
Twenty-five questions in ten years, and 42% of them HARD. This is a one-page guide because the honest advice is short: learn the twelve Five Year Plans, target three or four marks, and don't let it eat time from Geography or History.
- Single-page guide — bank too thin for a multi-route structure
- 75% of bank is Five Year Plans — 12-plan timeline as the recall anchor
- 41.7% HARD bank-wide — densest of any NDA subject, distractors are engineered
- Honest cap: ~6 marks/paper, target 3–4. Don't let it eat time from Geography/History.
2017–2026 · 17 papers
What makes these different
All ten guides are built the same way: pull every PUBLIC question from the bank, classify it, look at the patterns. Every “drill the N questions” link goes to the exact set we’re talking about. No claim survives that the data doesn’t back up.
Each guide is shaped by its bank, not by a shared template — open any guide above to see the structure that matches that subject’s past-year question shape.