UPSC CMS 2026: Notification, Vacancy, Syllabus, Cut Off, Result

UPSC CMS (Combined Medical Services Examination) is conducted by the Union Public Service Commission to recruit for Medical Officer Grade in the General Duty Medical Officers Sub-cadre of the Central Health Service, Assistant Divisional Medical Officer in the Railways, and General Duty Medical Officer in the MCD and NDMC. The CMS 2026 notification declares 1,358 — 864 Medical Officers in the Central Health Service, 450 Assistant Divisional Medical Officers in the Railways, 30 in the Municipal Corporation of Delhi and 14 in the New Delhi Municipal Council.

UPSC CMS selection process

1. Written Examination — Paper-I and Paper-II, objective type on an answer sheet
2. Personality Test / Interview

UPSC CMS selection runs through the stages below, each of which must be cleared in sequence.

1. Written Examination — Paper-I and Paper-II, objective type on an answer sheet
2. Personality Test / Interview

Exam pattern by stage

Document verification

UPSC verifies eligibility against original documents only after a candidate has qualified for the Interview or Personality Test. Until that point, admission to every stage is purely provisional — the issue of an e-Admit Card does not mean your candidature has been cleared. A candidate can therefore sit and clear a paper and still be found ineligible later.

Final merit

Merit is prepared from the marks that count for this examination, and posts are allotted by merit-cum-preference against the confirmed vacancies. Ties are broken by rules published by the Commission — typically the marks in the compulsory papers, and where those are equal, seniority in age.

UPSC CMS exam pattern

Total marks

Written 500 marks (Paper-I 250 + Paper-II 250) + Personality Test 100 marks = 600 marks.

Negative marking

Yes — one third of the marks assigned to a question is deducted for each wrong answer.

UPSC does not normalise marks

This is the single most common misconception carried over from SSC. UPSC conducts each paper in one sitting with one question paper, so there are no shifts to equate and no normalisation formula. A published UPSC cut off is a raw mark you could actually have scored on the paper — which is why the figures are clean numbers rather than five-decimal scores.

What is next for UPSC CMS

CMS 2026 was held on 2 August 2026 and the written result was declared on 1 September 2026. Personality Tests run from 12 October to 17 December 2026. The CMS 2027 notification is due on 3 March 2027 for an examination on 18 July 2027.

CMS Eligibility

UPSC CMS eligibility requires the following. Passed the written and practical parts of the final MBBS examination. Candidates who have appeared, or are yet to appear, at the final MBBS may apply — admission is provisional until proof of passing is produced. The age limit is Must not have attained 32 years as on 1 August 2026 — born not earlier than 2 August 1994. For Medical Officers Grade in the General Duty Medical Officers Sub-cadre of the Central Health Service the upper limit is 35 years as on 1 August 2026. The upper limit is further relaxed for reserved categories, Ex-servicemen and Persons with Benchmark Disability.

Educational qualification

Passed the written and practical parts of the final MBBS examination. Candidates who have appeared, or are yet to appear, at the final MBBS may apply — admission is provisional until proof of passing is produced.

Age limit

Must not have attained 32 years as on 1 August 2026 — born not earlier than 2 August 1994. For Medical Officers Grade in the General Duty Medical Officers Sub-cadre of the Central Health Service the upper limit is 35 years as on 1 August 2026. The upper limit is further relaxed for reserved categories, Ex-servicemen and Persons with Benchmark Disability.

Age relaxation

A candidate who belongs to SC, ST or OBC and is also an Ex-serviceman or PwBD candidate is eligible for cumulative relaxation under both heads.

Number of attempts

No limit on attempts within the age window.

Nationality

A candidate must be a citizen of India, or fall within the other categories of nationality set out in the Examination Notice — which for most services include subjects of Nepal and Bhutan, Tibetan refugees who came to India before 1 January 1962, and persons of Indian origin who have migrated from certain countries with the intention of permanently settling in India.

CMS Application Form

UPSC CMS applications are submitted online at upsconline.nic.in. Since 2025 UPSC uses a four-module portal, and three of those modules can be completed before the notification is even published.

Important dates — CMS 2026

Application fee

₹200. Female, SC, ST and PwBD candidates are exempted.

The URN and the Common Application Form

UPSC issues every candidate a Universal Registration Number (URN), which is registered once in a lifetime and is common to every UPSC examination. The Application Number, by contrast, is generated per examination and changes each time. Keep both — UPSC asks for them in any future correspondence.

How to apply

1. Create an account on upsconline.nic.in.
2. Complete Universal Registration to generate your URN. This can be done at any time — you do not need to wait for a notification.
3. Fill the Common Application Form (CAF) with your personal details, qualification and category, and upload the supporting documents. A live photograph must be captured at this stage in addition to the uploaded photo.
4. Open the examination-specific module during the application window, choose your centre and options, pay the fee and submit.

UPSC advises using an Aadhaar card as the identity document, because it verifies automatically and avoids manual checks later.

Correcting your application

UPSC provides a one-time facility to update the URN profile. Changes made to the profile do not flow back into applications already submitted — they apply only to applications made after the profile is re-locked. This catches people out every cycle.

CMS Vacancy

UPSC CMS vacancies for CMS 2026: 1,358 — 864 Medical Officers in the Central Health Service, 450 Assistant Divisional Medical Officers in the Railways, 30 in the Municipal Corporation of Delhi and 14 in the New Delhi Municipal Council.

Posts covered

Medical Officer Grade in the General Duty Medical Officers Sub-cadre of the Central Health Service, Assistant Divisional Medical Officer in the Railways, and General Duty Medical Officer in the MCD and NDMC.

Pay

Pay Level 10 of the 7th CPC Pay Matrix (₹56,100 basic), plus Non-Practising Allowance and the usual central government allowances.

How UPSC announces vacancies

UPSC publishes an approximate vacancy figure in the Examination Notice and states in the same paragraph that the number is liable to alteration. The final figure is settled once the cadre controlling authorities confirm their requirements, which is usually after the Main Examination. The number in the notice is therefore an indication, not a commitment.

Reservation

Vacancies are reserved for Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes, Other Backward Classes, the Economically Weaker Sections and Persons with Benchmark Disability as fixed by the Government. The notice sets out the category-wise break-up, including the sub-categories of disability against which each PwBD vacancy is identified.

CMS Salary & Job Profile

UPSC CMS posts carry Pay Level 10 of the 7th CPC Pay Matrix (₹56,100 basic), plus Non-Practising Allowance and the usual central government allowances, plus Dearness Allowance, House Rent Allowance and Transport Allowance.

Posts and pay

Medical Officer Grade in the General Duty Medical Officers Sub-cadre of the Central Health Service, Assistant Divisional Medical Officer in the Railways, and General Duty Medical Officer in the MCD and NDMC.

Allowances

Because HRA and Transport Allowance are city-linked, two officers on identical basic pay take home noticeably different amounts — a metro posting pays more in allowances than a district posting, though the district posting usually comes with official accommodation and a vehicle.

Career progression

Promotion follows time scales fixed for the service, moving through Junior Time Scale, Senior Time Scale, Junior Administrative Grade, Selection Grade and above. The pay matrix levels rather than the entry salary are what make these posts competitive over a career.