AILET Sample Paper: Download Previous Year Question Papers (2026 to 2015) with Answer Keys

If you are preparing for AILET, sample papers and previous year papers are the closest thing you have to sitting the real exam before exam day. This page gives you two things most download pages skip. First, every paper you actually need, year by year, with answer keys. Second, a clear method for using them, because a paper you download and never analyse does almost nothing for your score. Everything here is built around NLU Delhi’s live pattern, and the same guidance runs through our own AILET programme.

AILET Sample Paper and Previous Year Papers at a Glance

Download AILET Previous Year Question Papers, Year by Year

AILET previous year question papers are the single best resource you have, because they are the genuine article. The wording, the difficulty and the way NLU Delhi frames a legal reasoning question are all things a sample paper can only imitate. Start with the most recent AILET question paper and work backwards.

A quick note on the AILET 2025 question paper and the AILET 2026 question paper specifically. These two are the most valuable in the whole set, because they are the most recent examples of exactly how NLU Delhi is testing right now. Solve these last, under full exam conditions, once you have finished your topic preparation. Treat them as a dress rehearsal, not as an early diagnostic.

Read This Before You Download: The Pattern Changed in 2022

This is the section that separates a useful AILET sample paper from a misleading one, and it is the part almost every download page leaves out.

AILET used to be a five-section exam. Until 2022 it tested English, General Knowledge, Legal Aptitude, Logical Reasoning and Mathematics. From 2022 onward NLU Delhi moved to a three-section paper, dropped Mathematics entirely and folded legal reasoning into a broader Logical Reasoning section. That means an AILET 2019 or AILET 2021 question paper looks quite different from the paper you will actually face.

Here is how to treat papers from each era:

• Papers from 2023 to 2026. These follow the current three-section pattern. Use them as full, timed mock tests. They are your primary practice.

• The 2022 paper. This sits on the boundary of the change. Useful, but read the instructions on the paper itself before you time yourself against it.

• Papers from 2021 and earlier. Do not use these as full mocks, because the sections and timing no longer match. They are still valuable for one thing: topic-level drills. An old English passage or a good logical reasoning set is still good practice for that skill, even if the paper as a whole is outdated.

If you only remember one thing from this page, remember this. Practising a full old paper under a timer trains you for an exam that no longer exists. Use recent papers for mocks and old papers for topics.

The Current AILET Exam Pattern Your Sample Paper Should Match

Before you can judge whether a sample paper is any good, you need to know what a real AILET paper looks like now. Here is the current BA LLB pattern, confirmed on NLU Delhi’s official pages.

A few pattern facts that should shape how you practise:

• The exam runs for 120 minutes. That is well under a minute per question once you allow for reading time. Speed under pressure is a skill you build only through timed papers.

• Logical Reasoning is the biggest section by far. At 70 questions it is nearly half the paper, and it now carries the legal-principle style questions that used to sit in a separate legal aptitude section. Weight your practice accordingly.

• Negative marking is real. You lose 0.25 for every wrong answer and score zero for a blank. A good sample paper session is not just about how many you got right, it is about whether your wrong answers cost you more than blind guessing would have.

• The mode is offline. AILET is a pen and paper OMR exam, so practise on printed papers and a real OMR sheet, not only on a screen.

The LLM paper has 100 questions and its own structure. If you are applying for LLM, use LLM previous year papers rather than BA LLB ones, because the two are not interchangeable. For the full topic list under each section, read our detailed AILET syllabus guide.

Sample Paper, Previous Year Paper, Mock Test: What Is the Difference?

Students use these three terms as if they mean the same thing. They do not, and knowing the difference helps you use each one at the right stage.

The honest order of preference is simple. Real previous year papers first, because nothing imitates the exam better than the exam. Good sample and model papers next, to keep practising once the recent real papers are used up. Mock tests throughout, for the timed pressure and the analysis they give you. You want a steady supply of all three, not a pile of one.

Where to Get Official AILET Sample Papers

There are two kinds of source, and you should understand both.

NLU Delhi, the official source. NLU Delhi publishes official AILET sample and model papers on its own website, under the BA LLB test pattern and syllabus section. These carry the most authority because they come straight from the body that sets the exam. The official previous year papers and their answer keys are the version to trust when any detail is in doubt.

Coaching and education sites. Many coaching institutes and education portals compile AILET question papers, sample papers and answer keys in one place, which is convenient when you want several years in a single sitting. These are useful for access and for extra sample sets, but when a coaching answer key and the official key disagree, the official key is the one that counts.

A practical routine: download the real previous year papers and their official answer keys first, then add sample and model papers from a source you trust for extra volume. Keep everything in one folder, sorted by year, so you are never hunting for a paper the night before a mock.

How to Actually Use an AILET Sample Paper

Downloading papers is the easy part. The score comes from how you use them. Here is the method we teach, and it works far better than simply solving paper after paper.

Step 1: Solve it like the real exam. Sit the whole paper in one 120 minute block, with no phone, no breaks and no checking answers midway. If you can, start at 2:00 PM, the actual AILET slot, so your concentration peaks at the right time of day. Use a printed paper and mark answers on an OMR sheet.

Step 2: Score it honestly with negative marking. Apply plus 1 for each correct answer and minus 0.25 for each wrong one. Your raw number of correct answers hides the damage that careless wrong answers do. The marking scheme is the truth.

Step 3: Analyse every wrong answer. This is where the improvement lives. For each mistake, decide which kind it was: a concept you did not know, a silly error, a misread question, or a guess that went wrong. The pattern in your mistakes tells you what to fix.

Step 4: Study the section split. Break your score down by English, Current Affairs and GK, and Logical Reasoning. Since Logical Reasoning is nearly half the paper, a weakness there costs you the most, so it deserves the most attention.

Step 5: Fix, then move to the next paper. Go back to the topics your mistakes exposed before you touch the next full paper. Solving five papers with proper analysis beats solving fifteen and never looking back.

Done this way, a single AILET previous year question paper can teach you more in an evening than a week of passive reading.

Section by Section: Using Papers to Target Your Weak Spots

Once you have a few papers scored and analysed, use them to attack each section on its own terms.

English Language, 50 questions. This section rewards reading speed and comprehension over memorised grammar rules. Pull the reading comprehension passages out of several old papers, even pre-2022 ones, and practise them as a set. Old English passages age well, because comprehension skill does not depend on the exam pattern.

Current Affairs and General Knowledge, 30 questions. This is the section where old papers help least, because the current affairs in a 2020 paper are history now. Use recent papers only to learn the style and depth of questions, then rely on the last twelve months of current affairs for the actual content. The static GK portion is worth revising from any year.

Logical Reasoning, 70 questions. This is the decisive section and the one that now carries the legal-principle questions. Drill it hardest. Take logical reasoning and legal reasoning sets from every recent paper, time them separately, and build both accuracy and speed. Improvement here moves your overall score more than anywhere else.

A Sample Paper Timeline From Now to Exam Day

With the AILET 2027 exam on 13 December 2026, here is a sensible way to fold papers into your final months. Adjust the dates to when you start. For the full official schedule and what to expect this cycle, see our AILET 2027 notification guide.

• Early stage, syllabus not yet finished. Do not sit full papers yet. Use old papers for topic-level drills as you complete each section, so you are practising the exact question style while you learn.

• Middle stage, syllabus mostly done. Begin full, timed papers from the 2023 and 2024 sets. Aim for one full paper a week, each followed by a full analysis session. Track your section-wise scores over time.

• Final four to six weeks. Increase to two full papers a week. Save the AILET 2025 and AILET 2026 papers for this window, and sit at least one of them at exactly 2:00 PM to train your body clock for the real slot.

• Last week. No new full papers. Revise your error notes, redo the questions you got wrong earlier, and keep your current affairs fresh. Rest matters more than one more paper in the final days.

Common Mistakes When Solving AILET Sample Papers

After years of guiding students through this, these are the errors that quietly cost marks:

1. Solving old papers as full mocks. A 2019 or 2021 paper trains you for the wrong exam. Use pre-2022 papers for topics only.

2. Skipping the analysis. A paper you solve but never review is a paper half wasted. The learning is in the mistakes.

3. Ignoring negative marking in practice. If you guess freely in a sample paper but plan to be careful in the real exam, you are not practising the real exam. Apply the marking scheme every time.

4. Practising only on screen. AILET is offline. Get used to a printed paper and an OMR sheet before exam day.

5. Neglecting Logical Reasoning. It is the largest section and the biggest score mover. Underpractising it is the most expensive habit on this list.

6. Using old current affairs. The GK content in an old paper is out of date. Learn the style from it, not the facts.

7. Hoarding the recent papers too long, or burning them too early. Save the two most recent papers for the end, but do not leave them unsolved out of nerves either.

AILET and CLAT Papers: Do They Overlap?

Many students prepare for both AILET and CLAT, so this comes up often. The two exams share a lot of ground in English, current affairs and reasoning, which means practising one builds real strength for the other. The difference is in how questions are framed and weighted. AILET leans heavily on Logical Reasoning, and its questions have their own flavour that only AILET papers capture.

The practical takeaway: CLAT papers are useful extra practice for the shared skills, but they do not replace AILET papers. For the exam you are actually sitting at NLU Delhi, AILET previous year question papers and AILET sample papers built on the current pattern are what matter most in the final weeks. If you are preparing for both, our CLAT coaching in Delhi NCR programme runs alongside the AILET track so the shared syllabus does double duty.

Turn Practice Into a Score

A folder full of AILET papers is only potential. The students who convert it into an NLU Delhi seat are the ones who treat every paper as a timed test, analyse every mistake and keep coming back to their weak sections. If you want that structure built for you, with timed mocks on the current pattern, detailed analysis and doubt sessions around NLU Delhi’s actual paper, see our best AILET coaching in Delhi NCR programme. And when you are ready to apply, our AILET registration guide walks you through the form, fee and deadlines.