Data Interpretation Questions for Bank Exams: 20 Solved Sets with Answers

Data Interpretation Questions for Bank Exams: Quick Answer

This set has 20 original Data Interpretation questions with full step-by-step working, written at bank Mains level. Every question is built on real numbers — sales figures, branch deposits, device sales, factory output and a family budget — and every calculation has been checked in code, so the answer you see is the answer the arithmetic gives. There are no logic puzzles dressed up as DI here. A competitor page that ranks for this topic is 521 days old and serves seating-style puzzles under a DI heading; this set does the opposite and sticks to what the Mains actually asks: read a table, a caselet, a bar graph or a pie chart, pull out the two or three numbers that matter, and compute.

DI is the section where bank Mains papers are won and lost, because it is the heaviest part of Quant and the most time-hungry. In the IBPS PO Mains, Data Interpretation carries 40 questions for 60 marks in 45 minutes — a full quarter of the paper's questions and nearly a third of its marks. In the SBI PO Mains, Data Analysis and Interpretation is 30 questions for 60 marks in 45 minutes, which means each question is worth two marks and a single set of five questions is worth ten. The RRB Mains Quant section is 40 questions for 50 marks in 30 minutes, the fastest DI you will face anywhere, while SBI Clerk Mains runs Quant at 50 questions for 50 marks in 45 minutes and IBPS Clerk Mains runs Quant at 40 questions for 50 marks in 35 minutes. The pattern is the same in every one of them: five or six questions hang off one dataset, so reading the data once and answering five questions from it is worth far more than solving five separate sums. Work this set in 25 minutes for the 20 questions — that is 75 seconds a question, close to real Mains pace — then read every explanation, including the ones you got right, because the working is where the speed comes from.

Key takeaway: DI rewards readers, not calculators. The candidates who score in DI are the ones who spend the first 30 seconds understanding what the table actually shows — what the units are, which year is which, whether a figure is a total or a share — and then compute only what the question asks. Never start calculating before you know which two numbers you need. In this set, questions 1 to 5 share one sales table, 6 to 10 share one caselet, 11 to 13 share one branch table, 14 to 17 share one bar graph, and 18 to 20 share one pie chart. That is exactly how the Mains behaves: one dataset, several questions, and the marks go to the candidate who reads once and answers five times.

What This Set Covers

The answer key at the bottom spreads across all five options — A 4, B 4, C 4, D 4, E 4 — so no option dominates, and no option repeats more than once in a row. If your own mock answers cluster on one letter, that is a signal to re-check, not a pattern to trust.

How to Use This Set

Give yourself 25 minutes and a blank sheet, the way the Mains timer works — once the section ends, you cannot return to it. Read each dataset once, slowly, and underline the units before touching the first question: ₹ crore in the sales table, thousands of units in the bar graph, percentages in the pie chart. Attempt the questions in order, because the questions inside a set are arranged to warm you up — the first question in each block is usually a straight total, and the later ones ask for the growth or the ratio that needs that total. Mark every question you guessed, and after the timer, rework the guessed ones before reading the explanations. A question you got right by guessing is still a gap. Keep a notebook of the exact step where you went wrong — wrong base year for a percentage, ratio not simplified, reading the wrong column — because the same three slips cause most DI losses. Finally, do the whole set a second time a week later, without looking at the answers. DI is a skill that improves fastest on the second attempt, when the dataset is familiar and only the method is being tested.

Table DI: Questions 1–5

Table DI is the most common DI type in bank Mains, and it is also the most forgiving, because every number you need is printed in front of you. The skill it tests is not calculation but selection: five brands, three years, fifteen numbers, and each question needs exactly two or three of them. The table below shows the annual sales, in ₹ crore, of five online grocery brands from 2022 to 2024. Read it once, note that the years run left to right and the brands run top to bottom, and then work the five questions. One warning before you start: growth questions in DI almost always ask for growth over the earlier year as the base, and the most common error in this block is dividing by the later year instead. Whenever a question says "growth from 2022 to 2024", the denominator is the 2022 figure, not the 2024 one.

Q1. What was the total sales of all five brands together in 2024? (Give the exact total in ₹ crore.)

A. ₹1,542 crore B. ₹1,587 crore C. ₹1,623 crore D. ₹1,498 crore E. ₹1,654 crore

Answer: B — ₹1,587 crore.

Explanation: Add the five 2024 figures: 372 + 270 + 396 + 234 + 315. First 372 + 270 = 642; then 642 + 396 = 1,038; then 1,038 + 234 = 1,272; then 1,272 + 315 = 1,587. The trap is option A, ₹1,542 crore, which is what you get if you accidentally add a 2023 figure for one brand.

Q2. By what percentage did FreshKart's sales grow from 2022 to 2024? (Round to the nearest whole percent.)

A. 48% B. 52% C. 60% D. 55% E. 62%

Answer: D — 55%.

Explanation: FreshKart sold ₹240 crore in 2022 and ₹372 crore in 2024, so the increase is 372 − 240 = ₹132 crore. Percentage growth = (increase ÷ original value) × 100 = (132 ÷ 240) × 100 = 0.55 × 100 = 55%. The base is the 2022 figure, ₹240 crore; dividing by 372 instead gives 35%, which is not among the options, and that is exactly why the base matters.

Q3. What is the ratio of GreenBasket's sales in 2023 to QuickMart's sales in 2024? (Give the ratio in its simplest form.)

A. 25 : 26 B. 15 : 16 C. 5 : 6 D. 25 : 24 E. 9 : 10

Answer: A — 25 : 26.

Explanation: GreenBasket sold ₹225 crore in 2023 and QuickMart sold ₹234 crore in 2024, so the ratio is 225 : 234. Both numbers divide by 9: 225 ÷ 9 = 25 and 234 ÷ 9 = 26, giving 25 : 26. The trap is option D, 25 : 24, a near-miss ratio with no basis in the table. Swapping the years the other way — GreenBasket's 2024 figure (270) against QuickMart's 2023 figure (195) — gives 270 : 195 = 18 : 13, which is not among the options at all, so a swapped-years answer cannot be right here.

Q4. Which brand recorded the highest percentage growth in sales from 2023 to 2024?

A. FreshKart B. GreenBasket C. DailyNeeds D. QuickMart E. UrbanFresh

Answer: E — UrbanFresh.

Explanation: Compute each brand's growth from 2023 to 2024: FreshKart (372 − 300) ÷ 300 = 72 ÷ 300 = 24%; GreenBasket (270 − 225) ÷ 225 = 45 ÷ 225 = 20%; DailyNeeds (396 − 352) ÷ 352 = 44 ÷ 352 = 12.5%; QuickMart (234 − 195) ÷ 195 = 39 ÷ 195 = 20%; UrbanFresh (315 − 252) ÷ 252 = 63 ÷ 252 = 25%. UrbanFresh's 25% is the highest. Note that DailyNeeds had the largest absolute sales in every year but the smallest percentage growth — absolute size and growth rate are different things, and DI questions love to confuse them.

Q5. What was the average sales of the five brands in 2023? (Give the exact average in ₹ crore, to one decimal place.)

A. ₹258.4 crore B. ₹271.2 crore C. ₹264.8 crore D. ₹260.0 crore E. ₹269.6 crore

Answer: C — ₹264.8 crore.

Explanation: Add the five 2023 figures: 300 + 225 + 352 + 195 + 252 = 1,324. Divide by 5 brands: 1,324 ÷ 5 = 264.8. The trap is option D, ₹260 crore, which is a rounded guess; the question asks for the exact average to one decimal place, and 264.8 is exact.

Caselet DI: Questions 6–10

A caselet is a DI set with no table at all — the data is hidden inside a paragraph, and your first job is to turn the words into numbers before you can answer anything. Caselets are the type most candidates skip in the Mains, which is exactly why they are worth the most marks per minute once you learn the method: write down every number as you read, convert every percentage into an actual count immediately, and never carry a percentage forward into the next step. The caselet below is about a mobile store's device sales in one month. Read it once, extract the numbers into a small table on your rough sheet, and then answer the five questions from your table, not from the paragraph.

In April 2026, a mobile store sold 1,500 devices in total. Smartphones were 60% of all devices sold, tablets were 25%, and laptops were the remaining 15%. Among smartphones, Android and iOS models were sold in the ratio 3 : 2. Among tablets, 40% were sold online and the rest were sold offline. Among laptops, 40% were sold online and the rest offline. One-third of all smartphones were sold online.

Q6. How many Android smartphones did the store sell in April 2026?

A. 540 B. 480 C. 600 D. 520 E. 560

Answer: A — 540.

Explanation: Smartphones were 60% of 1,500 devices, so the store sold 1,500 × 0.60 = 900 smartphones. Android and iOS were in the ratio 3 : 2, so Android's share is 3 ÷ (3 + 2) = 3/5 of the smartphones: 900 × 3/5 = 540. The trap is option C, 600, which is what you get if you take 3/5 of the wrong base — 1,000 instead of 900.

Q7. How many tablets were sold offline in April 2026?

A. 150 B. 200 C. 250 D. 225 E. 275

Answer: D — 225.

Explanation: Tablets were 25% of 1,500 devices, so the store sold 1,500 × 0.25 = 375 tablets. Of these, 40% were sold online, so 60% were sold offline: 375 × 0.60 = 225. The trap is option A, 150, which is the number sold online — always check whether the question asks for the online or the offline figure before you stop calculating.

Q8. How many devices in total were sold online in April 2026?

A. 480 B. 540 C. 600 D. 510 E. 570

Answer: B — 540.

Explanation: Work out the online sales for each category and add them. Smartphones: one-third of 900 were sold online, so 900 ÷ 3 = 300. Tablets: 40% of 375 were sold online, so 375 × 0.40 = 150. Laptops: 15% of 1,500 is 225 laptops, and 40% of them were sold online, so 225 × 0.40 = 90. Total online = 300 + 150 + 90 = 540. The trap is option C, 600, which is 40% of the total 1,500 — but the online share is not 40% for smartphones, so you cannot take a shortcut here.

Q9. What is the ratio of iOS smartphones sold to laptops sold? (Give the ratio in its simplest form.)

A. 3 : 2 B. 5 : 3 C. 7 : 4 D. 9 : 5 E. 8 : 5

Answer: E — 8 : 5.

Explanation: iOS smartphones were 2/5 of the 900 smartphones, so 900 × 2/5 = 360. Laptops were 15% of 1,500, so 1,500 × 0.15 = 225. The ratio is 360 : 225. Both numbers divide by 45: 360 ÷ 45 = 8 and 225 ÷ 45 = 5, giving 8 : 5. The trap is option A, 3 : 2, which is the Android-to-iOS ratio from the caselet — a number that appears in the text but answers a different question.

Q10. Tablets sold offline formed what percentage of all devices sold in April 2026? (Give the exact percentage.)

A. 12% B. 18% C. 15% D. 10% E. 20%

Answer: C — 15%.

Explanation: From Q7, tablets sold offline numbered 225. The total devices sold were 1,500, so the percentage is (225 ÷ 1,500) × 100 = 0.15 × 100 = 15%. The trap is option A, 12%, which is what you get if you divide by 1,875 — a number that appears nowhere in the caselet. Always divide by the total the question names, which here is all devices sold.

Missing-Data DI: Questions 11–13

Missing-data DI is the Mains' favourite way to test whether you can work backwards. The table gives you some values and some ratios, and the question asks you to find the value that is not printed — then, usually, to use it in the next question. The method is always the same: a ratio is a relationship between two numbers, so if you know one number and the ratio, you can find the other. The table below shows deposits and loans, in ₹ crore, for four branches of a bank, with two values missing. The loan-to-deposit ratio is loans divided by deposits, expressed as a percentage. Fill in the missing values on your rough sheet before answering.

Q11. What were the deposits of the South branch, in ₹ crore?

A. ₹560 crore B. ₹600 crore C. ₹640 crore D. ₹580 crore E. ₹620 crore

Answer: B — ₹600 crore.

Explanation: The South branch's loans were ₹420 crore and its loan-to-deposit ratio was 70%, so loans = 70% of deposits. That means deposits = 420 ÷ 0.70 = ₹600 crore. Check: 70% of 600 is 420, which matches the loans figure. The trap is option A, ₹560 crore, which is what you get if you multiply 420 by 1.33 instead of dividing by 0.70 — when a value is a percentage of an unknown, you divide, never multiply.

Q12. What were the loans of the East branch, in ₹ crore?

A. ₹312 crore B. ₹364 crore C. ₹325 crore D. ₹351 crore E. ₹338 crore

Answer: E — ₹338 crore.

Explanation: The East branch's deposits were ₹520 crore and its loan-to-deposit ratio was 65%, so loans = 65% of deposits = 520 × 0.65 = ₹338 crore. Check: 520 × 65 = 33,800, and 33,800 ÷ 100 = 338. The trap is option B, ₹364 crore, which is 70% of 520 — the South branch's ratio applied to the East branch's deposits. Always use the ratio printed on the same row as the numbers you are working with.

Q13. What was the total loans of all four branches together, in ₹ crore?

A. ₹1,418 crore B. ₹1,402 crore C. ₹1,436 crore D. ₹1,389 crore E. ₹1,451 crore

Answer: A — ₹1,418 crore.

Explanation: Add the four loans figures, using the two you found in Q11 and Q12: North 360 + South 420 + East 338 + West 300. First 360 + 420 = 780; then 780 + 338 = 1,118; then 1,118 + 300 = 1,418. This question rewards you for the two before it — if you found the missing values correctly, this one is a single addition. If you guessed either missing value, this one goes wrong too, which is why missing-data sets punish guessing more than any other DI type.

Bar-Graph DI: Questions 14–17

Bar graphs look easy, and that is the danger. The bars give you the numbers at a glance, but the questions still need the same care as a table: read the value of each bar exactly, check the units, and do not estimate a bar's height when the value is printed. The bar graph below shows the number of units, in thousands, produced by a factory in each month from January to May 2026. The values are: January 120, February 150, March 135, April 180, May 165 (all in thousands of units). Read the five values, write them down, and then answer the four questions.

Q14. What was the total production of the factory from January to May 2026, in thousands of units?

A. 720 B. 780 C. 735 D. 750 E. 765

Answer: D — 750.

Explanation: Add the five months: 120 + 150 + 135 + 180 + 165. First 120 + 150 = 270; then 270 + 135 = 405; then 405 + 180 = 585; then 585 + 165 = 750. The answer is in thousands of units, so the total is 750 thousand units, or 7,50,000 units. The trap is option B, 780, which is what you get if you misread March's bar as 165 instead of 135.

Q15. By what percentage did production increase in February over January? (Round to the nearest whole percent.)

A. 20% B. 30% C. 25% D. 28% E. 22%

Answer: C — 25%.

Explanation: Production rose from 120 thousand units in January to 150 thousand in February, an increase of 150 − 120 = 30 thousand units. Percentage increase = (30 ÷ 120) × 100 = 0.25 × 100 = 25%. The base is January's figure, 120. The trap is option A, 20%, which is what you get if you divide the increase by February's figure, 150, instead of January's.

Q16. What was the average monthly production of the factory from January to May 2026, in thousands of units?

A. 150 B. 145 C. 155 D. 148 E. 152

Answer: A — 150.

Explanation: From Q14, total production over the five months was 750 thousand units. Average = total ÷ number of months = 750 ÷ 5 = 150 thousand units per month. Notice that the average equals February's production exactly — that is a coincidence of these numbers, not a rule, so do not use it as a shortcut on other sets. The trap is option B, 145. It looks like a plausible average, but the average of the first four months alone is (120 + 150 + 135 + 180) ÷ 4 = 585 ÷ 4 = 146.25 — not 145 — so 145 is not even the four-month average. Only the full five-month total (750 ÷ 5 = 150) gives the right answer.

Q17. In which month was production the second highest?

A. January B. February C. March D. April E. May

Answer: E — May.

Explanation: Rank the five months by production: April 180 (highest), May 165 (second highest), February 150, March 135, January 120 (lowest). So the second highest month is May. The trap is option B, February, which is the second highest if you misread May's bar as lower than February's. Ranking questions are free marks if you write the five values down in order first, and lost marks if you try to rank them by eye from the bars.

Pie-Chart DI: Questions 18–20

Pie charts test a different skill from tables: every value is a share of one total, so the first step is always to find the total and then convert each percentage into an amount. The pie chart below shows how a family spends its monthly income of ₹60,000: Food 25%, Rent 30%, Education 15%, Transport 10%, Savings 20%. The five shares add up to 100%, which is your first check on any pie chart — if the percentages do not add to 100, you have misread one of them. Convert each share into rupees on your rough sheet before answering: Food ₹15,000, Rent ₹18,000, Education ₹9,000, Transport ₹6,000, Savings ₹12,000.

Q18. How much does the family spend on rent every month?

A. ₹15,000 B. ₹18,000 C. ₹20,000 D. ₹16,500 E. ₹21,000

Answer: B — ₹18,000.

Explanation: Rent is 30% of the monthly income of ₹60,000, so rent = 60,000 × 0.30 = ₹18,000. The trap is option A, ₹15,000, which is the amount spent on food (25% of ₹60,000) — the largest-looking slice is not always the one the question asks about.

Q19. How much does the family spend on food and education together every month?

A. ₹21,000 B. ₹22,500 C. ₹25,500 D. ₹24,000 E. ₹27,000

Answer: D — ₹24,000.

Explanation: Food is 25% and education is 15%, so together they are 25% + 15% = 40% of the monthly income. 40% of ₹60,000 = 60,000 × 0.40 = ₹24,000. You can also add the two amounts separately — food ₹15,000 plus education ₹9,000 equals ₹24,000 — and both routes agree, which is a good check. The trap is option A, ₹21,000, which is 35% of ₹60,000, the result of adding 25% and 10% instead of 25% and 15%.

Q20. By how much do the family's monthly savings exceed its transport spending?

A. ₹4,500 B. ₹5,000 C. ₹6,000 D. ₹7,500 E. ₹3,000

Answer: C — ₹6,000.

Explanation: Savings are 20% of ₹60,000, which is ₹12,000, and transport is 10% of ₹60,000, which is ₹6,000. The difference is 12,000 − 6,000 = ₹6,000. The faster route is to subtract the percentages first: 20% − 10% = 10%, and 10% of ₹60,000 is ₹6,000. The trap is option D, ₹7,500, which has no basis in the chart at all — it is there to catch anyone who guesses instead of subtracting.

Answer Key

Key spread: A 4, B 4, C 4, D 4, E 4. No option is correct more than four times out of twenty, and no option repeats more than once in a row anywhere in the key.

Common Mistakes

The first and most expensive mistake in DI is using the wrong base for a percentage. Growth is always measured against the earlier value, and a share is always measured against the total the question names. In Q2, dividing by the 2024 figure instead of the 2022 figure changes the answer completely; in Q10, dividing by anything other than the 1,500 total devices gives a wrong percentage. Before you divide, say to yourself what the base is, and check that the base is the number the question actually describes. The second mistake is reading the wrong row or column. In a table with five brands and three years, it is easy to take GreenBasket's 2024 figure when the question asked for 2023, and in a pie chart it is easy to answer with the food figure when the question asked about rent. Point at the exact cell with your pen before you copy the number. The third mistake is stopping one step early. In Q8, the online total needs three separate calculations, and in Q13 the total needs the two missing values from the questions before it; candidates who answer after the first step lose marks they had already earned. The fourth mistake is confusing absolute size with growth rate. DailyNeeds had the biggest sales in the table and the smallest growth rate, and the exam knows that candidates will pick the biggest brand when asked about the fastest growth. The fifth mistake is guessing on ranking questions instead of writing the values in order — Q17 is free if you list the five months, and lost if you judge the bars by eye. Finally, never carry a rounded number into the next step. If a percentage works out to 12.5%, keep the 12.5% until the final answer; rounding in the middle is how a correct method produces a wrong option.

Memory Tricks

Three fast methods cover most DI calculations, and they are worth practising until they are automatic. First, percentage change: always write it as (new − old) ÷ old × 100, and cancel before you multiply. In Q15, 30 ÷ 120 is 1 ÷ 4 before it is 25%, and seeing the fraction first is faster and safer than doing long division. Second, ratios: divide both sides by their highest common factor in one step rather than in stages. In Q3, 225 : 234 looks awkward until you notice both end in digits divisible by 9, and 25 : 26 falls out at once; in Q9, both 360 and 225 divide by 45. Practise spotting the common factor — 9, 15, 25 and 45 cover most DI ratios — and the ratio questions become the fastest marks in the section. Third, approximation with a check: when the options are far apart, round the numbers to one significant figure, compute, and pick the nearest option, but when two options are close together, compute exactly. In Q5 the options were 258.4, 264.8 and 271.2, close enough that only the exact division works, while in Q1 the options were far enough apart that a rough addition would have found the right one. A fourth trick is specific to pie charts: convert every percentage into rupees once, at the start, and answer every question from the rupee figures instead of going back to percentages each time. And a fifth, for caselets: turn the paragraph into a table before answering anything. The five minutes spent extracting the numbers saves ten minutes of re-reading the paragraph for every question, and it is the single biggest speed gain in DI.

Frequently Asked Questions

How many DI questions come in the IBPS PO Mains?

40 questions for 60 marks in 45 minutes. DI is the largest section of the IBPS PO Mains Quant paper, and it is worth 60 of the paper's 200 marks, so it decides more of your score than any other Quant topic. Practise full sets of five questions from one dataset, not single questions, because that is how the exam presents them.

How many DI questions come in the SBI PO Mains?

30 questions for 60 marks in 45 minutes, under the heading Data Analysis and Interpretation. Each question is worth two marks, so one set of five questions is worth ten marks — the same as an entire reasoning puzzle. A single careless set can cost you a tenth of the paper.

Is DI asked in the Clerk Mains as well?

Yes. SBI Clerk Mains has a Quant section of 50 questions for 50 marks in 45 minutes, and IBPS Clerk Mains has a Quant section of 40 questions for 50 marks in 35 minutes, and DI sets make up a large part of both, usually two or three sets of five questions each. RRB Mains Quant is faster still: 40 questions for 50 marks in 30 minutes, so DI speed matters even more there.

What is the difference between table DI and caselet DI?

In table DI the data is printed in rows and columns and your job is to pick the right cells. In caselet DI the data is hidden in a paragraph and your job is to extract the numbers first and then compute. Caselets take longer to start but are often easier to compute, because the numbers are rounder. Candidates who skip caselets lose easy marks; the method in this set — turn the paragraph into a table before answering — removes the difficulty.

How do I solve missing-data DI questions?

Work backwards from the ratio. If you know the loans and the loan-to-deposit ratio, the deposits are loans divided by the ratio, as in Q11. If you know the deposits and the ratio, the missing value is deposits multiplied by the ratio, as in Q12. Write the relationship as an equation first — loans = ratio × deposits — and then rearrange it, instead of guessing whether to multiply or divide.

Should I attempt DI first or last in the Quant section?

Attempt the DI set whose data looks cleanest first — a table with round numbers, or a pie chart with simple percentages — and leave the caselet with messy numbers for later. Within a set, answer the easy questions first: totals and single-step percentages before ratios and multi-step questions. Never spend more than 6 minutes on one five-question set in the Mains; if a set is stuck, move on and come back only if time remains.

How much time should one DI set of five questions take?

About 5 to 6 minutes in the Mains, which is roughly a minute per question plus a minute to read the data. In practice, aim for 75 seconds a question while learning, and 60 seconds a question once the methods in this set are familiar. If a set is taking more than 7 minutes, you are re-reading the data too often — that is the sign to extract the numbers onto your rough sheet once, at the start.

Practice Next

• Table Data Interpretation for Bank Exams — two fully solved table sets and the derived-table trick.
• Pie Chart Data Interpretation for Bank Exams — pie-chart method and solved sets.
• Bar Graph Data Interpretation for Bank Exams — bar-graph sets and comparison questions.
• Caselet DI for SBI Clerk — caselet method with SBI Clerk sets.
• Percentage Tricks for SSC CGL — the percentage methods every DI question depends on.
• Percentage Questions with Answers for SSC and Bank Exams — 20 solved percentage questions.
• Approximation Questions for Bank Exams — the approximation skill that speeds up DI calculation.
• SBI Clerk Quant Questions — Mains-level Quant practice for SBI Clerk.
• IBPS RRB Clerk Quant Questions — Quant practice for the fastest Mains paper.
• IBPS PO Mains Data Interpretation Mock Test 02 — timed DI practice at IBPS PO Mains level.
• IBPS Clerk Data Interpretation Mock Test 03 — timed DI practice at IBPS Clerk Mains level.

Sources: IBPS PO, SBI PO, IBPS Clerk, SBI Clerk and IBPS RRB Mains exam patterns as per the official notifications for the 2026 cycle; all datasets, companies, branches, figures and questions in this set are original and written for this page. As of 6 November 2026.