SSC CGL 2024 Tier-I · 12 September 2024, Shift 2 · General Intelligence and Reasoning · Question 10 of 100

Text as printed on a candidate's response sheet for this shift; answer per SSC's tentative key as marked on that sheet. Solution last reviewed 6 September 2026.

Where this paper and its answers come from

SSC does not publish CGL question papers or a public answer key. The questions and options here are reproduced as printed on a candidate's own response sheet for this shift — the Commission's text, unchanged. Each answer is SSC's tentative key as marked on that sheet; SSC allowed challenges to it and never publishes a final key. The solutions are written by UnlockIAS.

How many squares are there in the given figure?

(a)10
(b)9
(c)7
(d)8

Answer

Why

Correct — B. Rule: count by size, and accept a box only when all four of its sides are drawn.

Large, 1: the big square that fills the figure.

Medium, 5: the square hanging off the top-left corner, the equal square overlapping it at the big square's corner, the square that hangs across the lower middle, and the two side-by-side squares sitting on the bottom edge.

Small, 3: the patch where the two top-left squares cross, plus the two cells that the long horizontal line and the vertical below it cut out of the lower half of the middle square.

1 + 5 + 3 = 9 — option (b).

Why the others are wrong

(a)
10 — Ten is one too many. The block along the bottom right, closed by the long horizontal and the big square's right edge, is twice as wide as it is tall — a rectangle, not a square.
(c)
7 — Seven keeps the middle square whole and misses the two small cells that the horizontal line and the vertical cut out of its lower half.
(d)
8 — Eight is what you get after missing the overlap patch where the two squares at the top-left cross. That overlap is itself a square and has to be counted.

Concept

Counting figures is a systematic job, not a visual one. Work by size: take every smallest square first, then every square built from the next size up, and finish with the largest.

A shape counts only when all four of its sides are actually drawn. A region closed on three sides by nothing is not a square, and neither is a bounded box that is wider than it is tall.

Overlaps are the easy marks and the easy misses. Where two squares cross squarely, the overlapping patch is itself a square and belongs in the total.

The stem is a picture, so the layout is read off the image: a large square, two equal squares overlapping its top-left corner, one medium square hanging across its lower middle, and a horizontal line with a vertical beneath it that split the bottom strip into two medium squares.

Key facts

The nine break down as 1 large, 5 medium and 3 small squares.
The overlap of two crossing squares is itself a square only when the crossing is square on both axes.
A bounded region wider than it is tall is a rectangle and must be left out of the count.

Study next

Counting triangles in a figure built from intersecting straight linesCounting rectangles, where each pair of horizontals with each pair of verticals gives oneCounting squares in an n by n grid, which sums the squares 1, 4, 9 and so on

Common traps

Counting the wide block on the bottom right, which is a rectangle two squares across
Missing the overlap patch between the two squares at the top-left corner
Missing the two small cells inside the medium square that hangs across the middle

Square-counting figures are asked at 17 Sep 2024, 12:30, Reasoning Q.1, where the key is 20, and at 25 Sep 2024, 09:00, Reasoning Q.3, where it is 17.

Related PYQs

No directly related past PYQ was found.