What is a good GMAT score for ISB?

The Indian School of Business (ISB) is one of the top Business Schools in India providing a world-class education to working professionals. ISB follows “One school two campuses” (Hyderabad and Mohali) for its high-tech education.

Unlike most of the other Business schools in India, ISB does not accept CAT scores for admission.

Being an ISB applicant, trying to increase your chances of getting into your dream school, you should be aware that your score on the Graduate Management Admission Test (GMAT) is an important factor. However, what qualifies as a strong GMAT score for ISB depends on both the competitiveness of the program and your profile. 

Based on a survey conducted by Poets & Quants in the analysis of MBA admission criteria, GMAT score has a weightage of 22%.

You may wonder what is a good GMAT score to get an admit at ISB?

But it is not just the GMAT score, there are many other factors that are considered in the admission process. Further discussion will give you a better idea.

Let’s try to understand what a good GMAT score is by analyzing the average GMAT score for ISB PGP over the last five years.

Here are the average GMAT scores for ISB PGP from 2018 to 2023:

YEAR	GMAT SCORE RANGE	ISB AVERAGE GMAT SCORE
2023	600-780	720
2022	610-780	713
2021	600-780	710
2020	600-770	710
2019	600-780	709

There is no GMAT cut-off set by ISB. From the data of the past five years, we understand the average GMAT score for ISB has increased from 709 to 720. We can see that the competition has increased year on year.

Keeping in mind this increased competition, what would be a good GMAT score for ISB that gives you the confidence to get an admit?

To get a clear idea, let’s first understand the applicant data from gmatclub tracker based on shortlisted, waitlisted, and admitted candidates for the PGP class of 2022.

This is not an exhaustive data set. This data has been collected by real people who applied to ISB PGP admissions in 2022.

Number of applications	781	Application withdrawn	137
Invited to interview	419	Interviewed	394
Waitlisted	112	Admitted from WL	15
Deferred to next year	2	Admitted	210
Denied	61

Classification by GMAT score: Number of applicants invited to the interview (ISB class 2022)

This data shows the number of applicants, and interview invites for GMAT scores for ISB from 600 to 780.

GMAT SCORE	NUMBER OF APPLICATIONS	INTERVIEW INVITES	PERCENTAGE OF INTERVIEW INVITES
780	1	–	–
770	11	11	100
760	7	7	100
750	15	15	100
740	24	23	95.9
730	55	48	87.2
720	63	61	96.8
710	97	88	90.7
700	55	48	87.2
690	46	38	82.6
680	33	32	96.9
670	8	4	50
660	7	4	57
650	3	–	–
640	2	–	–
630	2	–	–
620	2	1	50
610	1	–	–
600	1	1	100

From the above data, we infer that almost everyone with a GMAT score of more than 740 were invited for the interview.

In total, 301 candidates out of 328 applicants with a GMAT score of 700+ were invited to the interview.

97 applicants had a GMAT score of 710, (which is the highest number of applicants registered for a particular score) out of which 88 candidates were invited for the interview.

And very few candidates with a score less than 660 got an interview invite.

The interview invites decreased from 100% for GMAT score of 770 to 87% for GMAT score of 730 which further decreased to 82% for GMAT score of 690.

The higher your GMAT score for ISB is, the better are the chances to get an invite to the interview.

However it is not the only criteria to get an admit at ISB, your academic performance, extracurricular activity, essay analysis, recommendation letter, and interview performance are also considered.

According to the survey conducted by Poets & Quants, essay analysis and interview performance have the second-highest weightage of 15 and 12 percent respectively in the evaluation of the MBA admission process.

ISB interview, check this article for interview tips and interview questions by A M Kannan, Ex ISB Director, Admissions and Financial Aid, Senior Mentor at ISBmantra.

Number of candidates admitted to the ISB class 2022 by GMAT score

GMAT SCORE	INTERVIEW INVITES	ADMITTED	CONVERSION RATE (in %)
780	–	–	–
770	11	5	45.45
760	7	5	71.4
750	15	10	66.6
740	23	19	82.6
730	48	31	64.5
720	61	25	40.9
710	88	57	64.7
700	48	11	22.9
690	38	11	28.9
680	32	11	34.3
670	4	2	50
660	4	1	25
650	–	–	–
640	–	–	–
630	–	–	–
620	1	–	–
610	–	–	–
600	1	–	–

We can see that the conversion rate is higher for the GMAT score of 740+ and the conversion rate decreases as the GMAT score decreases. Though one applicant with a score of 600 and 620 each were invited, they couldn’t get an admit.

The conversion rate for the applicants having a GMAT score of 760 is 71% and for the applicants having a GMAT score of 770 is just 45%. So we understand having a high GMAT score is a gateway to the admission process, it does not guarantee admission to ISB.

What is a good GMAT score for ISB?

Considering the heavy competition of the one-year MBA (PGP), a GMAT score for ISB which will give you the credibility to get an interview invite is 730+.  

While these are scores that can give an applicant an edge over the competition, at ISBmantra we have several applicants who have received admits with scores much lower than this, primarily because they had a diverse/strong profile, well-developed application, and a high interview score. 

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