What is the right way to compare two MBA offers?

On five published numbers per side, not on brand temperature. One: the complete fee — both years, with housing in or out. Two: the placement median where a school publishes one, else the average with its denominator. Three: the exam-attempt policy, because it decides whether a retake can improve your entry. Four: the refund route and its dates. Five: the real city cost. Anything not on an official page goes in the comparison at zero weight.

One offer is from a famous brand and one from a less famous school with better numbers. Which wins?

The numbers, if they are published and verified. A less famous school with a fully published two-year fee, an audited placement report and a written refund route is a safer admit than a famous name whose second-year fee arrives only in the offer letter. Brand matters for the network; but you repay the loan from the placement median, not the logo.

How do I compare a one-year and a two-year MBA offer?

Add the opportunity cost line. Great Lakes' own pages make the contrast concrete: the one-year PGPM costs Rs 23.5 lakh all-in and reports a class-of-2025 average of Rs 18 LPA, while the two-year PGDM costs Rs 22.5 lakh and reports Rs 15 LPA — but the PGPM assumes work experience and the PGDM does not. The shorter programme returns you to salary a year earlier; price that year before comparing totals. Our [format guide](/guides/one-year-vs-two-year-mba-india/) walks the full decision.

Should I wait for a better offer next cycle or take the one I have?

Decide with the attempt rules, not hope. If your offer came through NMAT and the target is NMIMS, a retake cannot help — NMIMS accepts only the first attempt. At KJ Somaiya the best of two NMAT attempts counts, so a retake is genuinely recoverable there. Check whether next cycle's door is actually open before declining this cycle's offer, and read the refund rules of the seat you hold before paying to block either.

An agent says he can upgrade my offer to a better college for a fee. Is that a real comparison?

No. An offer exists only when the college's official process produces it; nobody sells an upgrade to it. Every school in this worksheet — NMIMS, KJ Somaiya, Christ, Great Lakes, FLAME, the IIMs — publishes its process and denies any paid side channel in writing. Comparing a real offer against an agent's verbal one is comparing a document against a promise.

Comparing Two MBA Offers: The Honest Worksheet (2026)

Compare two MBA offers on published facts: full two-year fee, audited placement median, attempt rules, refund route and city cost — worked examples inside.

By Piyush Agarwal, 10 years in direct admissions counselling · Last verified 21 August 2026 · every claim linked to its source · Latest change: Initial publication; every worked example drawn from official pages opened during this verification pass (Aug 2026)

The short answer

In August 2026, comparing two MBA offers honestly takes five published numbers per side: the complete two-year fee (both years, housing included or not), the audited placement median where one exists, the exam-attempt policy you used to get in, the refund route and deadline, and the city cost. This worksheet does the arithmetic with verified examples.

Two admit letters on the table is a good problem — and the moment families are most likely to decide on gossip. This worksheet replaces the gossip with five published numbers per side. Every example below uses figures we opened on official pages in August 2026; where a school has not published a number, the cell says so, because an unpublished number is itself a fact about the offer.

Check 1: the complete fee, both years, one bundle

Put the full outflow, not the first year. KJ Somaiya publishes both years — Rs 11,52,000 plus Rs 12,35,500, Rs 23,87,500 total for 2026-28, hostel separate. NMIMS’s NMAT 2026 handout publishes Rs 13,50,000 per annum for AY 2026-27 “for information only” and defers the second year to the offer letter — so NMIMS’s full total is half-published today. Christ publishes both years at Rs 5.70-5.80 lakh per year plus a non-refundable Rs 8,000 registration. FLAME and Great Lakes bundle housing into their totals; Somaiya and Christ do not. Two offers are comparable only after every line sits in the same table.

Check 2: the placement number, read correctly

Median where published, else average-with-denominator, and always the same salary head. The audited standard is IIM Ahmedabad’s 2025 report: median maximum earning potential Rs 34.53 lakh against median fixed cash of Rs 25.32 lakh. At average-only publishers — MICA’s Rs 19.22 LPA, Great Lakes’ Rs 18 LPA (PGPM) and Rs 15 LPA (PGDM) for the class of 2025 — the average is all you get, so the follow-up questions (audited? how many students? which head?) carry the weight. The full method is on our average-vs-median page.

Check 3: the attempt policy that produced the offer

This line decides whether “wait and retry” is a real option. NMIMS counts only your first NMAT attempt; KJ Somaiya counts the best of two. Great Lakes accepts GMAT scores going back to 1 January 2024 across all editions; IIM Calcutta’s MBAEx refuses online GMAT scores outright. If your plan B depends on a retake, verify the target school’s attempt and validity rules before you decline anything — the verified rules are on our GMAT/GRE map and percentile-band page.

Check 4: the refund route and its dates

Every offer you pay to block is a financial exposure until you join. Read the cancellation clause in the offer letter, find the university’s official withdrawal route, and note the dates. NMIMS runs withdrawals through its online cancellation process under the UGC refund policy (12 June 2024) for non-technical programmes and AICTE rules per its handout; the deposits that come back (caution money at Somaiya, Great Lakes, FLAME; library and hostel deposits at WeSchool) are published, and the ones that do not (Christ’s Rs 8,000 registration) are published too. The full money map is on our scholarships, loans and refunds page.

Check 5: the city cost nobody puts in the brochure

The same fee buys different lives in different cities. Mumbai housing sits outside KJ Somaiya’s published fee; Great Lakes’ Chennai totals bundle it. Build the outstation budget before deciding — our NMIMS outstation checklist shows the line items, and the method transfers to any city.

The worked example: two Mumbai offers

Take the pair families bring us most: NMIMS Mumbai vs KJ Somaiya. Fee: Somaiya fully published at Rs 23,87,500; NMIMS half-published at Rs 13.5 lakh for year one. Entry: NMIMS needed your first NMAT attempt; Somaiya takes the best of two across nine accepted exams. Selection: NMIMS runs a competency test plus interview; Somaiya publishes exact weights (interview 30%, exam 25%, profile 25%, WAT 10%, PSA 10%). Quota: neither has one, both say so in writing. The full side-by-side lives on our NMIMS vs KJ Somaiya page. Run your own pair through the same five checks — and if the official pages leave a cell empty, that is your answer about which school is easier to hold accountable.

If you have two (or three) letters and want the worksheet filled with your actual numbers, send them over. We will build the comparison from the official pages, cite every figure, and tell you which offer is stronger on evidence — including when the honest answer is “neither, wait for the window that opens next.”

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Straight answers

What is the right way to compare two MBA offers?: On five published numbers per side, not on brand temperature. One: the complete fee — both years, with housing in or out. Two: the placement median where a school publishes one, else the average with its denominator. Three: the exam-attempt policy, because it decides whether a retake can improve your entry. Four: the refund route and its dates. Five: the real city cost. Anything not on an official page goes in the comparison at zero weight.
One offer is from a famous brand and one from a less famous school with better numbers. Which wins?: The numbers, if they are published and verified. A less famous school with a fully published two-year fee, an audited placement report and a written refund route is a safer admit than a famous name whose second-year fee arrives only in the offer letter. Brand matters for the network; but you repay the loan from the placement median, not the logo.
How do I compare a one-year and a two-year MBA offer?: Add the opportunity cost line. Great Lakes' own pages make the contrast concrete: the one-year PGPM costs Rs 23.5 lakh all-in and reports a class-of-2025 average of Rs 18 LPA, while the two-year PGDM costs Rs 22.5 lakh and reports Rs 15 LPA — but the PGPM assumes work experience and the PGDM does not. The shorter programme returns you to salary a year earlier; price that year before comparing totals. Our [format guide](/guides/one-year-vs-two-year-mba-india/) walks the full decision.
Should I wait for a better offer next cycle or take the one I have?: Decide with the attempt rules, not hope. If your offer came through NMAT and the target is NMIMS, a retake cannot help — NMIMS accepts only the first attempt. At KJ Somaiya the best of two NMAT attempts counts, so a retake is genuinely recoverable there. Check whether next cycle's door is actually open before declining this cycle's offer, and read the refund rules of the seat you hold before paying to block either.
An agent says he can upgrade my offer to a better college for a fee. Is that a real comparison?: No. An offer exists only when the college's official process produces it; nobody sells an upgrade to it. Every school in this worksheet — NMIMS, KJ Somaiya, Christ, Great Lakes, FLAME, the IIMs — publishes its process and denies any paid side channel in writing. Comparing a real offer against an agent's verbal one is comparing a document against a promise.

Sources

Page updated 21 August 2026. Rules, fees and dates change; confirm with the institution and the official authority before acting.

Plan the admit, honestly.