CBSE syllabus 2025-26 for Class 10, 12 out; new ‘best of 2’ exam format, must-know changes

NEW DELHI: The Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) has published the CBSE syllabus 2025-26 for Class 10, 12 academic year 2025-26. The CBSE curriculum consists of comprehensive guidelines on academic content, learning outcomes, and syllabus for CBSE board exam 2026.

The CBSE Board has proposed a major revamp, including holding two board exam s for CBSE Class 10 students, increase in competency-based questions, and reforms in revaluation process.

The CBSE Class 10 board exam 2026 will be held twice a year - in February and April - from the academic year 2025-26. The CBSE Class 12 board exams, however, will be held only once a year. Additionally, the board also announced that the CBSE Class 12 board exam 2026 will begin from February 17 next year and around 20 lakh students are expected to appear in the higher secondary exams.

The board has instructed schools to teach subjects in line with the prescribed CBSE syllabus, “integrating experiential learning, competency-based assessments, and interdisciplinary approaches to enhance students' conceptual understanding and application”.

CBSE schools have also been advised to implement “contextualized and flexible teaching methodologies” to cater to diverse learning needs as per the recommendations made in the National Curriculum Framework-2023 .

Further, it asked teachers to give importance to “project-based learning, inquiry-driven approaches, and technology-enabled education”.

Also read CBSE adopts new re-evaluation process, split Class 10 science question papers; will test on-screen marking

CBSE Class 10 syllabus 2025-26

The CBSE Class 10 grades corresponding to the marks will be done on the basis of a 9-point grading system. The CBSE Class 10 board exam will be held for a total of 80 marks in all subjects, except for compulsory subjects which consist of 20 marks of internal assessment .

Students will have to obtain 33 percent in total in each of these subjects to be declared pass. Out of the three subjects - Computer Application (Code 165), Information Technology (Code 402) and Artificial Intelligence (code 417) - only one can be offered, the CBSE said, adding that students are required to choose English or Hindi as one of the two languages in Class 9 or 10.

In case a student fails in one three subjects - science, mathematics and social science, or in a language paper, but qualifies a skill subject or in language paper opted as sixth optional subject, then the subject will be replaced by the skill or language subject qualified for computation of results.

Also read Holding CBSE Class 10 twice can lead to ‘paper leaks, irregularities’, warns parliament panel

Also read When will CBSE Class 10 results 2025 be declared? Overall exam paper analysis

CBSE Class 12 syllabus 2026 PDF

The CBSE Class 12 board exam 2026 will also be assessed using the 9-point grading scale. The board has also added four new skill electives for CBSE Class 12 namely - land transportation associate, electronics and hardware, physical activity trainer, and design thinking and innovation.

Out of three subjects - Informatics Practices (065), Computer Science (Code 083), and Information Technology (Code 802), a candidate can opt only for one subject.

CBSE Class 12 subject combinations 2025-26 :

The CBSE Class 12 syllabus covers seven major learning areas - languages, humanities, mathematics, sciences, skill subjects, general studies and health, and physical education.