Railways · Government Exams

RPF Exam Pattern

Every figure here is from CEN RPF 01/2024 and 02/2024 — what the CBT asks, what a wrong answer costs, who qualifies and what the physical tests demand for each post.

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RPF · checked 19 September 2026

The dates, vacancies and rules below are read on the conducting body’s own site and rewritten as each notice appears. The guide beneath carries the full pattern, syllabus, cut-offs and free mock tests.

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19September 2026

Checked 19 September 2026

RPF: the facts that matter now

01
4,208 Constable and 452 SI vacancies notified 15 April 2024; Constable CBT 2–18 March 2025, PET/PMT 13 November – 6 December 2025, panel 16…
Last cycle
02
No RPF CEN issued as of 15 September 2026; the 2024 CENs define the pattern the next notification will follow
Next cycle
03
Railway Recruitment Boards for the Railway Protection Force and RPSF — CEN RPF 01/2024 (Sub-Inspector) and CEN RPF 02/2024 (Constable)
Conducted by
04
Constable (Executive), Pay Level 3, ₹21,700; Sub-Inspector (Executive), Pay Level 6, ₹35,400
Posts

Pattern

RPF — RPF Constable and SI exam pattern: the CBT, negative marking, PET and PMT

RPF recruitment for both Constable and Sub-Inspector has one computer-based test, a physical efficiency test, a physical measurement test, document verification and a medical examination. The CBT builds the merit; the physical tests are pass or fail. The structure of the CBT is identical for the two posts; the standard of the questions is class 10 for Constable and graduate level for SI.

RPF CBT — Constable and Sub-Inspector. Objective; 1 mark per question; 90 minutes; one third of a mark deducted per wrong answer; no mark for unattempted questions.
Section	Questions	Marks	Coverage
General Awareness	50	50	Current events, history, geography, polity and constitution, economy, art and culture, sports, general science and everyday awareness
Arithmetic	35	35	Number system, whole numbers, decimals and fractions, fundamental operations, percentages, ratio and proportion, averages, interest, profit and loss, discount, tables and graphs, mensuration, time and distance
General Intelligence and Reasoning	35	35	Analogies, similarities and differences, spatial visualisation and orientation, problem solving, judgement, decision making, visual memory, discriminating observation, relationship concepts, arithmetical reasoning, verbal and figure classification, number series, non-verbal series, coding and decoding, statement–conclusion, syllogism
Total	120	120

How the CBT is used

Minimum marks — 35 per cent for UR, EWS and OBC; 30 per cent for SC and ST.
Shortlist for PET/PMT — Ten times the vacancies in each category for men, women and ex-servicemen on normalised CBT merit; a second round of ten times any shortfall, and at most two rounds.
Merit — CBT marks, normalised and scaled to 100, decide the panel among candidates who clear the physical tests and verification.
Normalisation — Where a test runs in more than one shift, marks are normalised across shifts by the RRBs’ published formula, and it is the normalised score — not the raw mark — that is compared with the cut-off and used for shortlisting.

Physical Efficiency Test — qualifying; one chance for the run, two for each jump; ex-servicemen exempt.
Post	1,600 m run (men)	800 m run (women)	Long jump	High jump
Constable (Executive)	5 minutes 45 seconds	3 minutes 40 seconds	14 feet (men), 9 feet (women)	4 feet (men), 3 feet (women)
Sub-Inspector (Executive)	6 minutes 30 seconds	4 minutes	12 feet (men), 9 feet (women)	3 feet 9 inches (men), 3 feet (women)

Physical Measurement Test — qualifying; chest for men only.
Category	Height, men	Height, women	Chest, men (unexpanded / expanded)
UR, EWS and OBC	165 cm	157 cm	80 / 85 cm
SC and ST	160 cm	152 cm	76.2 / 81.2 cm
Garhwalis, Gorkhas, Marathas, Dogras, Kumaonese and other notified categories	163 cm	155 cm	80 / 85 cm

For reference, the SI cut-offs of 3 March 2025, scaled to 100, were 75.96 (UR), 73.71 (OBC), 72.73 (EWS), 69.00 (SC) and 67.27 (ST) for men and 69.18 (UR), 70.95 (OBC), 71.11 (EWS), 65.78 (SC) and 62.43 (ST) for women; the Constable panel of 16 February 2026 empanelled 4,205 candidates against 4,208 vacancies.

What the pattern means for how you attempt the paper

General Awareness is 50 of 120 — Recall; the largest and fastest section, and the one that separates candidates who read daily from those who do not.
A third off per error — Blind guessing loses; two-option guesses only.
Physical standards are not negotiable — Height and chest cannot be trained; check them before applying. The run and jumps can, and should be trained from the first week.

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