The Graduate Aptitude Test in Engineering (GATE) was first held on February 26, 1983. The entrance exam was conducted to select candidates for admission to all postgraduate (PG) engineering courses for three semesters at the five Indian Institutes of Technology at Bombay, Delhi, Kanpur, Kharagpur and Madras, and the Indian Institute of Science (IISc) Bangalore.

GATE is now held as an entrance test for admission to master’s and doctoral programmes in the IITs, IISc and for recruitment by a few public sector undertakings.

Only those get admitted after qualifying at the GATE were entitled to scholarships for 18 months.

The eligibility criteria remain almost the same in these 41 years. The students who held a bachelor’s degree in engineering or technology or those who were presently in the final year of such course could appear for the engineering stream of GATE. However, Associate Members of the Institution of Engineers (AMIE) completed candidates or any other equivalent examination recognised by the Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) for employment purposes were also eligible to appear for the engineering stream.

MSc degree holders in agricultural sciences, chemistry, earth sciences, life sciences, mathematics, materials science, physics, regional planning or those in the final year of one such course were eligible to take the science stream of GATE.

Nowadays, the bifurcation of engineering and science streams in GATE is not there. Any undergraduate student can register for GATE now and also those who are currently in the third year or higher years of any government-approved programme in the engineering, technology, architecture, science, commerce, arts or in humanities are eligible to appear for GATE 2025.

However, the paper pattern has changed. The GATE paper now has three types of questions — multiple choice questions (MCQ), multiple select questions (MSQ) and numerical answer type (NAT). The paper is held for a total of 100 marks with 15 marks of general aptitude. For a wrong answer in an MCQ, there will be negative marking, while there is no negative marking for wrong answer(s) to MSQ or NAT questions.

The GATE result in its debut batch was declared on the basis of the percentile, fractile classification within each discipline and not on the basis of absolute marks. Now, the raw marks (for single session test papers) or normalised marks (for multi-session test papers) are used for computing the GATE score, based on the qualifying marks.

Unlike these years where application process is completely online, the completed GATE application form, along with the registration fee, was to be sent to IIT Bombay, IIT Kanpur, IIT Delhi or IISc Bangalore — according to the choice of exam centres at which the candidate wished to appear for.

In the first edition of GATE, the request for application form should be accompanied by a crossed Indian Postal Order for Rs 5 drawn in favour of the concerned IIT or IISc along with a self-addressed envelope (22 cm x 32 cm ) stamped for Rs 4.50. The envelopes were asked to send the GATE admit cards. The application form was to be accompanied by a registration fee of Rs 45 which was non-refundable. Students belonging to Scheduled Caste (SC) and Scheduled Tribe (ST) were exempted from the payment of the registration fee.

The GATE admit cards now are released online at the GATE official website. The admit cards are released before the start of the exam.