Deloitte NLA: the National Level Assessment pattern, and how to prepare
Deloitte's India offices of the US firm hire Analyst Trainees through what its job postings call the NLA, the National Level Assessment: an off-campus route that runs alongside its campus program and is open, by report, to engineering and non-engineering graduates alike. Deloitte's students page lists the campus steps and says its assessment tests vary across business areas; its recruitment page describes the online application and a campus interview after selection. Neither describes the NLA paper, so its sections come from prep sites and the candidates who sat the 2026 cycle.
Those reports agree closely: one 90-minute assessment of 67 questions in four or five parts, quantitative aptitude and logical reasoning, English, computer fundamentals and coding, followed by one interview that mixes technical and HR questions. Four of the five parts are what December Code measures. This page marks each claim, maps the sections to the subjects here, names what the site does not cover, and ends with a practice set from pages whose samples are already public.
December Code is not affiliated with, endorsed by or connected to Deloitte. This page summarises how Deloitte NLA (Analyst Trainee) is publicly described, from the sources listed at the end, checked on 29 September 2026. Where a detail comes from prep sites or candidate reports rather than Deloitte itself, the page says so. The notification or test invitation for the drive you are sitting is the source of truth, and where it differs from this page, it is right.
How the process runs
A round is marked official when Deloitte describes it on its own pages, and commonly reported when the description comes from prep sites and candidate reports.
- 1
Application and resume screeningofficial
Deloitte's recruitment page describes a fully online application: a job-specific profile, a resume, transcript details and location preferences, saved page by page and editable until the deadline, with automatic acknowledgement. NLA postings appear on its US-India careers site by campus batch, most recently for the 2026 batch.
- 2
The online assessmentcommonly reported
Reported as 90 minutes and 67 questions with no negative marking and no backward navigation between sections: 12 logical reasoning and 10 quantitative questions in 25 minutes, 13 English questions in 10 minutes, 30 computer-fundamentals questions in 25 minutes, and two coding tasks in 30 minutes. Deloitte's own page says only that assessment tests vary by business area.
- 3
Interviewcommonly reported
Reported as a single virtual conversation of 15 to 45 minutes that combines technical and HR questions: the project, coding logic, a few fundamentals, and behavioural fit. Deloitte's students page lists pre-placement talks and selection rounds for campus candidates; NLA candidates report going straight from the assessment to this interview.
- 4
Offerofficial
The last of Deloitte's listed steps. Candidates report that results come by email and that the timeline between assessment and interview varies by location.
What the test asks, and what prepares you for it
4 of 5 sections map to a December Code subject. The rest are named below, not glossed over.
| Section | What it tests | Prepare with |
|---|---|---|
| Logical Reasoningcommonly reported | Series, coding-decoding, arrangements, syllogisms, blood relations and data sufficiency. Commonly reported as 12 questions, sharing 25 minutes with the quantitative part. | Aptitude |
| Quantitative Aptitudecommonly reported | Number systems, algebra, ratios, profit and loss, time and work, probability and geometry. Commonly reported as 10 questions in the shared 25 minutes. | Aptitude |
| Englishcommonly reported | Sentence improvement, synonyms and antonyms, error identification and reading comprehension. Commonly reported as 13 questions in 10 minutes, ten of them multiple-choice and three fill-in-the-blank. | |
| Computer Fundamentalscommonly reported | C and C++ output and concepts, DBMS, computer architecture, networking and operating systems. Commonly reported as 30 questions in 25 minutes, the largest section. | CC++DBMSOperating SystemsComputer NetworksDSA |
| Codingcommonly reported | Two tasks in 30 minutes: a short coding nugget and a live programming question, in C, C++, Java or Python, graded on test cases. Reports mention dynamic-programming-style problems, which is ambitious for the time. | DSACC++JavaPython |
Ninety minutes, and the biggest section is computer fundamentals
The NLA is reported as a single sitting with sectional timers you cannot revisit, and its weight is unusual: computer fundamentals is the largest section at 30 questions, more than aptitude and English together. That rewards a computer-science student who has kept the core subjects warm and punishes one who prepared only aptitude. The fundamentals are reported as breadth rather than depth, C and C++ output questions, DBMS concepts, operating-system and networking definitions and a little architecture, at under a minute each.
The aptitude sections are short and, by report, standard: series and arrangements on the reasoning side, number systems, ratios, work and probability on the quantitative side. With no negative marking reported, every question should get an answer. English is ten minutes and outside this site's scope.
The coding section
Two tasks in 30 minutes is tight, and the reported mix, a small nugget plus one live programming question, means the first should take five minutes and the second the rest. Reports that mention dynamic programming should be read with the time limit in mind: a problem solvable in 25 minutes under test conditions is a recognisable one, a longest common subsequence or a coin change, not a novel one. The practice that pays is knowing the handful of classic shapes and being able to write a correct loop-based solution quickly in the language you name.
December Code prepares the data-structure and language reasoning behind those tasks in MCQ form; it does not execute code. The DSA pages carry the classic problems with worked solutions, and the C, C++, Java and Python pages carry the traps that make a correct-looking solution fail a test case.
How the season runs
The NLA is an off-campus cycle with a registration window, not a rolling posting. The 2026 cycle, by a prep-site report updated in September 2026, closed its application window in January 2026, and that report describes the eligible degrees as ranging from three-year programs to engineering and master's degrees. Deloitte's students page says assessment tests vary across business areas, and reports say the format changes by location and role, so a 2027 cycle may not match this page exactly. The posting on Deloitte's US-India careers site for the batch you belong to is the source for dates and eligibility.
What December Code covers here, and what it does not
The diagnostic and practice cover Aptitude, DSA, DBMS, Operating Systems, Computer Networks, C, C++, Java, Python: the subjects behind 4 of the 5 sections above. It does not cover the following, and no page here pretends to:
- English: a ten-minute section of grammar, vocabulary and comprehension with its own share of the marks.
- Computer architecture, which reports list among the fundamentals topics and which December Code does not have a subject for.
- The coding tasks' execution: two problems graded on test cases in 30 minutes. December Code prepares the reasoning in MCQ form and does not run your code.
- Eligibility and dates: they belong to the NLA posting for the cycle you are in.
What could not be confirmed from Deloitte
- The section counts and durations (12 and 10 aptitude questions in 25 minutes, 13 English in 10, 30 fundamentals in 25, two coding tasks in 30, 67 questions in 90 minutes) are prep-site and candidate reports. Deloitte states only that its tests vary by business area.
- The interview's length, which reports put anywhere between 15 and 45 minutes.
- The 2026 cycle's eligibility list and deadline, reported by a prep site, not read on a Deloitte page.
A practice set for Deloitte NLA (Analyst Trainee)
Topic pages in the subjects this process tests, each with the questions interviewers ask and one question from the bank exactly as the diagnostic asks it. Nothing is published for this page: every sample was already public on its topic page.
- Number series questionsSeries questions open most reported reasoning sections.
- Coding-decoding questionsA reasoning family reported in the NLA's logical section.
- Blood relations questionsReported in the logical section; quick once the notation is learned.
- Number system and divisibility questionsNumber systems lead the reported quantitative topics.
- Ratio and proportion questionsRatios underpin the reported profit-and-loss and mixture questions.
- Probability questionsReported at the harder end of the quantitative section.
How the diagnostic asks it
One public question per subject, the same one its hub shows. The answer is marked because these are public; in a sitting you choose first, then see why each option is right or wrong.
In a class of 80 students, 65% passed the mathematics exam. How many students passed?
- 155
- 252correct
- 360
- 448
65% of 80 = (65/100) x 80 = 52. So 52 students passed the exam.
Which of the following operations on an unsorted array of n integers takes O(n) time in the worst case?
- 1Finding the maximum elementcorrect
- 2Appending an element at the end when spare capacity already exists
- 3Reading the element at index k
- 4Reading the array's length
In an unsorted array the maximum could be anywhere, so every element must be examined: O(n). Indexed reads are O(1) because the address is computed from the base and the index; appending into existing spare capacity just writes one slot, O(1); and the length is stored, so reading it is O(1). Only a sorted array would let the maximum be read directly.
Measure it
Knowing the pattern tells you what is coming. A diagnostic tells you what you would get wrong.
10 Aptitude questions across its topics, easy to hard, about fifteen minutes. You get a readiness figure with the arithmetic shown, the topics you missed named, and a practice set sized for today. Free: 1 diagnostic a month and 15 problems a day. No card.
Sources, and when they were checked
Pattern last verified 29 September 2026, against the pages below. Patterns change between drives and cycles; when a source changes, this page changes and the date moves with it. A source marked official is Deloitte’s own; the others are the established prep sites and candidate reports the “commonly reported” details come from.
- officialDeloitte US-India Offices: Students· the seven campus steps and the statement that assessment tests vary across business areas
- officialDeloitte US-India Offices: Recruitment process· the online application and what follows selection
- prep sitePlacement Preparation: Deloitte syllabus and test pattern 2026· the four-section, 67-question, 90-minute pattern with its counts and the no-negative-marking and no-backward-navigation notes
- prep siteGUVI: Deloitte NLA program 2026· what NLA is, the 2026 cycle's reported eligibility and closed window, and the caveat that the format changes by location and role; updated 22 September 2026