APPSC department posts 2026: how do these exams work, and how do you prepare?

Which APPSC department posts are open in 2026, and who can apply?

APPSC's web note of 15 September 2026 lists 19 brief notifications, 08/2026 to 26/2026, for 729 provisional posts outside Group 1 and Group 2. Most posts ask for a degree in a named subject, so the posts below are grouped by what they ask for.

Any bachelor's degree

A degree in a named subject

A master's degree

School or ITI level

Qualification not printed yet

Two conditions do not fit in the table. Inspector of Factories needs the two years in industry certified by the employer. The English Reporters need shorthand at 150 words a minute.

For Executive Officer Grade-III, the last notification, 10/2025, kept the post for people who profess the Hindu religion; the EO Grade 3 page quotes the lines.

Where a brief prints no qualification, the "last time" line comes from the commission's previous notification for the same post, and the detailed notification can change it. Industrial Promotion Officer was last recruited under notification 11/2022 (various non-gazetted posts, post code 07), with a Paper II titled "Applied Science and Engineering and Management". We have not verified that notification's qualification line, so its row shows none.

The EO brief makes the date of the detailed notification the date you must hold your degree by. Look for the same line in yours.

How are the department post exams built?

All 19 of APPSC's department-post briefs of 15 September 2026 print a single-level online exam, with no screening test and no interview. Paper I is General Studies and Mental Ability, worth 150 marks in every post except Forest Beat Officer. One to three subject papers follow, so the written total runs from 200 to 600 marks. 18 of the 19 briefs take off one third of the marks for the question for each wrong answer; the Forensic Science brief, 11/2026, prints no penalty line.

After the written exam. Every brief adds a Computer Proficiency Test of 100 marks in 60 minutes, a practical test on office software under G.O.Ms.No.26 of 24 February 2023. You only need to pass it: 40 marks for OC, 35 for BC, and 30 for SC, ST and persons with benchmark disabilities.

Extra tests for a few posts. Forest Range Officer, Forest Section Officer and Horticulture Officer add a qualifying test in General English and General Telugu at SSC standard, 50 marks each, and you must pass each language. Forest Beat Officer has a qualifying essay instead, written in English, Telugu or Urdu. The three forest officer posts also have a walking test and a medical examination.

For the Reporters, Paper II is shorthand dictation that you write out in longhand, with no options to choose from.

What does Paper I cover, and how do I prepare for it?

Paper I in APPSC's department-post briefs of 15 September 2026 is General Studies and Mental Ability. Most of the 19 posts share one version with 10 headings: eight are general studies, from current events to disaster management, and the last two are reasoning and data analysis. Two posts print a shorter version, set out below.

• Same Paper I in 17 of 19
• Printed at degree standard in 15 of them
• Draughtsman (15/2026): SSC standard, shorter list
• Forest Beat Officer (18/2026): 100 marks, shorter list

The 10 headings

• Major current events and issues: international, national and Andhra Pradesh
• General science in daily life; recent developments in science, technology and IT
• History of India, social, economic, cultural and political, with a focus on Andhra Pradesh and the national movement
• Geography of India with a focus on Andhra Pradesh
• Indian polity and governance: constitutional issues, public policy, reforms, e-governance
• Indian economy and planning
• Sustainable development and environmental protection
• Disaster management: vulnerability, prevention, mitigation, remote sensing and GIS
• Logical reasoning, analytical ability and logical interpretation
• Data analysis: tables, charts, mean, median, mode, variance, interpretation

Much of this ground is shared with the first stage of Group 1 and Group 2. The Group 1 Prelims gives 30 marks each to history, polity, economy and geography in its first paper, then 60 to mental ability, 30 to science and technology and 30 to current events in its second. The Group 2 Screening of February 2024 had five blocks of 30 marks and no polity or economy block. Paper I here names both, and adds environment, disaster management and data analysis.

Take it one heading at a time, with one method for every chapter: read to understand; close the book and say it back; do the past questions on that chapter; tick the tracker for understanding; come back in a week, then a month, then before the exam. Reasoning and data analysis improve with a little practice most days rather than a long weekend session.

For past questions, start with the Executive Officer exam held under notification 10/2025. Its Paper I follows the same 10 headings, and the commission keeps the booklets and final keys on its keys to papers page.

How should I split time between Paper I and the subject paper?

In APPSC's 2026 department-post exams, the marks set the split. In the nine 300-mark exams of 15 September 2026, Paper I and the subject paper carry 150 each, half and half. In the eight 450-mark exams, the subject papers carry 300, two thirds of the total. For Forest Range Officer, Paper I is 150 of 600, a quarter.

Your subject paper is usually your degree subject, asked at the paper's own standard. Most are at degree standard. The papers for the two Assistant Director posts under 09/2026 and 10/2026 are at postgraduate standard, Industrial Promotion Officer's is at diploma standard, and the mathematics papers for the forest posts are at SSC standard.

Each brief prints the syllabus of its subject papers in its annexure. Start there. Break it into units, copy them onto the tracker, and take one unit at a time with the same chapter method. Your degree gave you the subject. Past questions matter as much as reading.

Paper I hours carry over if you sit more than one exam, because its headings overlap with Group 1, Group 2 and the other department posts. Subject-paper hours carry over less. The next section names two notifications where they do.

Can I prepare for a department post alongside Group 2?

APPSC's Group 2 notification for 673 posts is due on 15 October 2026 under G.O.Ms.No.81, and it is not printed yet. You can prepare for a department post alongside it. Paper I shares history, geography and current events with the Group 2 Screening. Two notifications share some subject ground with the Group 2 Mains: 20/2026 for Assistant Statistical Officer, and 26/2026 for Assistant Social Welfare and Assistant Tribal Welfare Officers.

In notification 26/2026, Paper II is "Social and Cultural History of Andhra Pradesh and Welfare Programmes". Its Paper III is "General Overview of the Indian Constitution and Welfare and Protection Measures for Weaker Sections".

These cover ground that Group 2 Mains Paper 1 also covers: the social and cultural history of Andhra Pradesh, and the Indian Constitution. The welfare parts are their own. Read the two syllabi side by side before you count on the overlap.

For notification 20/2026, Assistant Statistical Officer, units 1 to 3 of its Paper II cover national income, money and banking, inflation, public finance and planning in India. The economy section of Group 2 Mains Paper II covers the same ground. The rest of that paper is its own, so read its syllabus beside the Group 2 one too.

If you sit both, treat the Group 2 base as your main work and the department post's subject paper as the extra load, given hours in proportion to its marks. The Group 2 preparation guide sets out that base.

What is the plan from now until the exam?

APPSC has announced no exam date for any of the 19 department-post notifications as of 27 September 2026, so this plan runs on events rather than dates. It has three stretches: before your application window opens, after you apply, and once the commission sets the exam date. Hours and the order of subjects inside a stretch are yours; the method for each chapter stays the same.

The free department posts tracker (PDF) (తెలుగు) starts with a box for your application, the four application windows and a list of all 19 posts that shows where each post's subject-paper units begin. It then lists the Paper I topics and the subject-paper units of every post, each with tick columns. The last part shows how the marks split and has a mock log.

Questions people ask