IIT Madras, Bombay and Delhi took 408 of the top 500 JEE Advanced ranks

The JEE Advanced 2026 report reveals a sharp concentration of top ranks -- IIT Madras, Bombay and Delhi zones together account for 408 of the top 500 candidates, or 81.6% of the list.he JEE Advanced 2026 report reveals a sharp concentration of top ranks -- IIT Madras, Bombay and Delhi zones together account for 408 of the top 500 candidates, or 81.6% of the list. (AI-generated image)New Delhi,Oct 8, 2026 07:00 ISTJEE Advanced 2026: Three IIT zones produced 408 of the top 500 rankers nationwideThe JEE Advanced 2026 results reveal a striking concentration at the very top of India's most competitive engineering entrance exam. Three IIT zones together account for more than four out of every five candidates in the top 500 Common Rank List.IIT Madras leads the chart with 174 candidates in the top 500, followed by IIT Bombay with 120 and IIT Delhi with 114. Together, the three zones account for 408 of the top 500 rankers, or 81.6% of the list.The remaining four zones have much smaller shares. IIT Roorkee accounts for 46 candidates, while IIT Bhubaneswar has 23, IIT Kanpur has 16 and IIT Guwahati has 7. THE CONCENTRATION STARTS RIGHT AT THE TOPThe pattern is not limited to the top 500. It is already visible among the highest-ranked candidates.Of the top 100, IIT Madras, Bombay and Delhi together account for 87 candidates. Among the top 200, their combined tally rises to 168. They account for 245 of the top 300, 329 of the top 400 and finally 408 of the top 500. That means the three zones consistently account for more than 80% of candidates as the ranking expands from the top 100 to the top 500.The concentration is particularly sharp in the top 10. IIT Delhi has five candidates, IIT Madras has three and IIT Bombay has two. No other zone has a candidate in the top 10.Check out the zone-wise division of the top 500 JEE Advanced 2026 candidates as per the report:IIT zoneTop 10Top 100Top 200Top 300Top 400Top 500Total qualifiedIIT Madras3357310914617414,294IIT Bombay22347689212012,389IIT Delhi52948689111410,697IIT Roorkee09203036465,637IIT Bhubaneswar0151418235,428IIT Kanpur0361012165,552IIT Guwahati0011572,883Total1010020030040050056,880MADRAS LEADS THE TOP 500IIT Madras also has the highest number of qualified candidates overall, at 14,294. IIT Bombay follows with 12,389, while IIT Delhi has 10,697 qualified candidates.The difference is even clearer when looking at the top 500. Madras has 174 of its 14,294 qualified candidates in this group. Bombay has 120 of its 12,389 qualified candidates, while Delhi has 114 of its 10,697.The report also lists the top-ranked candidate from each zone. IIT Delhi's topper is Shubham Kumar, who secured AIR 1. IIT Madras' zone topper, Mohit Shekher Shukla, secured AIR 4, while IIT Bombay's B Jayakrishna Srinivas secured AIR 6.FOUR OTHER ZONES HAVE A MUCH SMALLER SHAREThe contrast with the other IIT zones is stark.IIT Roorkee has 46 candidates in the top 500, despite having 5,637 qualified candidates overall. IIT Bhubaneswar has 23 among 5,428 qualified candidates, while IIT Kanpur has 16 among 5,552.IIT Guwahati has the smallest representation, with seven candidates in the top 500 out of 2,883 qualified candidates.Overall, 56,880 candidates qualified for JEE Advanced 2026. But when the focus shifts from the entire qualified pool to the country's highest ranks, the distribution changes sharply, with IIT Madras, Bombay and Delhi accounting for 81.6% of the top 500.- Ends