“Minus 0.25” can be the wrong shortcut when questions carry different marks. First read the penalty rule, then apply it to the marks assigned to each question.
Checked 20 September 2026: SBI PO 2026 deducts one quarter of a question's assigned marks for a wrong objective answer; unanswered questions carry no penalty. Its official mains handout also gives scoring instructions. The examples below are original raw-score calculations before any official rounding, equating or normalisation.
Example 1: every question carries one mark
Suppose a practice section has one-mark questions. You answer 24 correctly, get 8 wrong and leave the remaining questions blank.
Correct-answer marks are 24. The penalty is 8 × 0.25 = 2. Your raw score is 22.
You attempted 32 questions, so accuracy is 24 ÷ 32 = 75%. The unanswered questions affect neither part of this raw calculation. Keep attempts, accuracy and marks in separate columns; they measure different things.
Example 2: every question carries two marks
Now suppose each question in a different practice set carries two marks. You get 15 correct and 5 wrong.
Correct-answer marks are 15 × 2 = 30. A wrong answer costs one quarter of two marks, which is 0.5. The penalty is 5 × 0.5 = 2.5, leaving a raw score of 27.5.
Deducting a flat 0.25 for each error would produce 28.75, which overstates the score. This is why you should read the question weights rather than copy a formula from another paper.
Example 3: mixed weights
Imagine a practice test with both one-mark and two-mark questions. In the one-mark group, you get 12 correct and 4 wrong: 12 − 1 = 11. In the two-mark group, you get 6 correct and 2 wrong: 12 − 1 = 11. Together, the raw score is 22.
Calculate each weight group separately before adding them. Do not estimate every question's value by dividing total marks by question count unless the scoring instructions establish equal weights.
More attempts can still mean fewer marks
Compare two hypothetical one-mark sections. Candidate A makes 30 attempts with 27 correct and 3 wrong: 26.25. Candidate B makes 35 attempts with 27 correct and 8 wrong: 25.
The extra five attempts in this example all went wrong. That does not mean attempting fewer is always better. It means the quality of an additional attempt matters. Review the questions you answered with little evidence and see whether a clearer elimination process was available.
For a one-mark question with a quarter-mark penalty, the simple expected raw value is 1.25p − 0.25, where p is your probability of being correct. It becomes positive above 20%. Your confidence is not a measured probability, so this arithmetic is not a guarantee or an instruction to guess blindly.
Use raw scores for review
Official scores can include procedures your notebook cannot reproduce. For example, the IBPS PO XVI notification describes normalisation across sessions. A raw estimate should therefore remain labelled as an estimate.
The exam guide hub links the different banking routes. Use the PO prelims timing plan to connect scoring with question selection. Keep the calculation alongside a brief error log: the point is to improve your next decision, not to predict a cutoff from remembered attempts.