Are NCERT Books Enough for NEET?

The particular question “Are NCERT Books Enough for NEET?” keeps puzzling most of the students during their NEET preparation days. Medical aspirants are the most common ones who ask this question every now and then. If you are following the CBSE curriculum for your Board exams, and a NEET aspirant at the same time, this question must be boggling your mind too, isn’t it? So here we are, with the answer to the most frequently asked question of medical aspirants.

Why NCERT Books are Important?

Before we delve into answering if they are enough for cracking NEET, let us have a glance at the “why”. Why do we say that NCERT books are important? Be it your boards or entrance exams or competitive exams, why is much emphasis put on NCERT books? Follow the following to know about that. 

1. Exam-oriented Content

When you go through previous year’s question papers after finishing NCERT books, you will definitely be amazed to find the similarities. You will find yourself solving most questions easily if you have given the NCERT books and NCERT Solutions a thorough reading. With regard to NEET, it has been seen that most questions in the Biology paper are based on NCERT books and a few are direct ones too. 

2. Simple, Easy and Concise

Written in lucid language and in an easy-to-grasp manner, NCERT books strengthen your foundation of knowledge. No advanced vocabularies are used in NCERT books. Also, the topics are presented in a concise manner so that the topics in the discussion are to-the-point. Revising an NCERT book is easier compared to reference books running over a thousand pages.

3. Easily Available and Less Costly

Compared to the reference books available in the market, NCERT books are a lot cheaper and easily available too. You do not have to hear “out of the market” frequently when you set out to buy NCERT books. Available nationwide, NCERT books are easy to locate from anywhere in the country.

4. The Number of Questions in NEET Appears from NCERT

Every year, the number of questions from NCERT sources changes. However, more than 80-85% of questions (asked directly or indirectly) in NEET come from NCERT on average. This can be deduced from the trends of the previous year's question paper of NEET.

Are NCERT Books Enough to Crack NEET?

Without much beating around the bush, we must tell you that in a word, the answer is “no”. Can you qualify the NEET examination only by reading NCERT books? Definitely. But for cracking NEET and studying the medical course, is achieving the mere cut off enough? Definitely not. Remember, AIIMS MBBS and JIPMER MBBS both have merged with NEET. Therefore, there is always a high chance that the National Testing Agency will raise the cut off marks and the questions will be of higher levels of difficulty. Can you achieve higher than cut off marks in NEET based only on NCERT books? No. So, what should you do? 

Here lies the importance of reference books. Prepare your base with NCERT books and sharpen them with reference books- that’s how you prepare for NEET. To score high and secure a position in the top 100 of the NEET qualifiers, NCERT books cannot be your sole saviour. 

The more you move along the advanced stages of NEET preparation, the more you should incline towards reference books. You must keep your focus fixed on NCERT but, it won’t be enough to give you your desired result in NEET.

Important Books for NEET Preparation Apart from NCERT

Some of the important books for NEET preparation apart from NCERT are given below subject wise.

Biology 

NCERT of biology is a great source for NEET but you should also follow the following books for biology preparation. 

• Biology by GRB Bathla’s Publications

• Objective NCERT at your fingertips - MTG

• NCERT Exemplar

• Cengage

• Objective Biology – Dinesh

• Trueman’s Biology – Volume 1 & Volume 2

• Biology by Pradeep’s Publications

Chemistry 

Chemistry questions are mainly asked by the NCERT book. But, you should also refer to the following books for chemistry apart from NCERT. 

• Organic Chemistry by Morrison and Boyd

• Physical Chemistry by O. P. Tandon

• Chemistry by Dinesh

• Concise Inorganic Chemistry by J. D. Lee

Physics 

These physics books, in addition to NCERT books for classes 11 and 12, will be helpful for your preparation. 

• D. C. Pandey, Objective Physics

• Concepts of Physics by H. C. Verma

• NOOTAN Physics by Kumar & Mittal

• Problems in General Physics by I. E. Irodov

• Fundamentals of Physics by Halliday, Resnick and Walker

Conclusion

So, prepare yourself from an early stage and befriend both NCERT and reference books for acing the skill of cracking one of the most prestigious entrance exams of the country, NEET.