International Relations drew 3,564 candidates in CSS 2025, yet only 16 of them were allocated, an overall conversion of 0.45% that ranks among the lowest of any major subject. The paper is considerably harder than its popularity would suggest, because with a mean of 31.5% the average candidate does not even clear the passing threshold. This is a subject where heavy demand runs straight into a genuinely difficult paper.
International Relations' mean of 31.5% trails the CSS optional-subject average of 43.5% by 12 points, which places it among the harder-scoring optionals despite all its visibility. Many candidates pick it expecting an accessible, current-affairs-friendly paper, and the data flatly contradicts that assumption. Because the subject sits below the field average, simply clearing 33% already puts a candidate ahead of most of the pack, yet with just 16 seats set against more than three and a half thousand applicants even a passing mark is far from a safe outcome. The realistic aim is to score well into the upper half of the distribution rather than to scrape over the line.
Of the 3,564 who appeared, just 53 cleared the written stage at a 1.49% pass rate, and 16 of those were ultimately allocated. Because the mean of 31.5% sits below the 33% threshold, the primary bottleneck is the paper itself, with most candidates failing International Relations before overall merit ever enters the picture. The further fall from 53 passers to 16 allocations shows a second filter operating at the merit stage, but the bulk of the attrition happens inside the paper.
At 63 of the 200 available marks the mean works out to 31.5%, just shy of the passing line, and with the median at 32% sitting marginally above it the distribution is close to symmetric with a slight left lean. The standard deviation of 20 marks, around 10 percentage points, stretches the band of typical performance from 21.5% at the lower end to 41.5% at the upper, so it straddles the threshold rather than sitting cleanly on either side. That makes it a high-risk paper to score in, since the average candidate fails and only those who beat the cohort mean push into passing territory. Its reputation as a comfortable, popular pick is not borne out by the figures, because this is a paper most candidates do not clear.
For such a popular subject the allocations were unusually evenly spread, with Punjab taking 5 of the 16 seats and Balochistan, KPK and Sindh Rural each securing 3, leaving Sindh Urban with 2. That flat distribution, which largely dissolves the usual Punjab dominance, reflects how few candidates manage to clear the paper in any single province.
Women took only 4 of the 16 seats, a 25% share that falls well short of the CSS-wide female allocation rate of 50.7%, and all four of those allocations came from Punjab. In a pool this small that amounts to a clear under-representation, with female candidates converting at roughly half the rate their overall presence in the examination would lead you to expect.
International Relations is a high-risk choice whose popularity tends to mask the danger, combining a hard paper, a sub-threshold mean and only 16 allocations out of thousands of hopefuls. It suits candidates with a deep, analytical grasp of the field who can write above the cohort under pressure, rather than those drawn in by its profile or its assumed accessibility. The pronounced gender gap and the very low conversion rate are further reasons to take it on only from a position of real strength.