SSC CGL 2024 Tier-I · 23 September 2024, Shift 2 · General Intelligence and Reasoning · Question 23 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 10 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 circles are there in the given figure?

(a)12
(b)10
(c)11
(d)13

Answer

Why

Correct — C. Count by size group rather than sweeping the picture.

Rule: every closed circular outline counts once, whether it nests inside another or overlaps one.

Three large circles fill the frame, each drawn inside the last and shifted slightly right and up, so their outlines crowd together along the top and the right.

Two medium circles sit in the middle, the smaller one crossing the larger.
Six small circles run along the bottom as three overlapping pairs — two circles in each group.

3 + 2 + 6 = 11, option (c).

Why the others are wrong

(a)
12 — 12 overshoots by one. The two outermost rings run very close along the top, and the narrow sliver between them reads as an extra circle at a glance.
(b)
10 — 10 falls one short. Each group along the bottom is two overlapping circles of slightly different size, and one pair is easily read as a single ring.
(d)
13 — 13 is two over. Only closed circular outlines count — the straight lines crossing the figure cut segments and lens-shaped areas, and none of those is a circle.

Concept

Figure-counting items are decided by method, not by eyesight. Sweeping the picture and tallying as you go both double-counts and skips.

Partition by size instead: identify the distinct radii, count each size class, then add. Here that is three large, two medium and six small.

The specific trap in circle-counting is overlap. Two circles that cross read as one lens-shaped blob at speed, but each is a full circle and each is counted once.

The figure is small and coarse as printed on the response sheet. Counting by size class is what keeps it reliable at that resolution — tracing every outline is not.

Key facts

Every closed circular outline counts once, whether nested inside another or overlapping it.
Straight lines and open arcs are not circles, however much area they enclose with a curve.
The size classes here are three large, two medium and six small, giving 11.

Study next

Triangle-counting figures, where the same size-class method appliesSquare-counting grids, counted by side length: 1×1, then 2×2, then 3×3Counting enclosed regions rather than shapes, a different question on the same style of picture

Common traps

Tallying while sweeping the picture, which double-counts wherever outlines cross
Reading two overlapping circles of similar size as one
Counting the regions that the straight lines cut off

Every one of the 35 CGL 2024 shifts carries exactly one figure-count in the Reasoning block, and 32 of them ask for triangles or squares.

Also asked 11 Sep 2024, 09:00, Reasoning Q.3 (triangles, answer 11) and 13 Sep 2024, 16:00, Reasoning Q.18 (squares, answer 11).

Related PYQs

No directly related past PYQ was found.