PTE Writing and Speaking

Personal Introduction

You’ll have 25 seconds to read the prompt and 30 seconds to speak about yourself.

Read Aloud

This type tests your reading and speaking skills.

You’ll see a prompt of up to 60 words. For this you will have 30-40 seconds to prepare and the response time depends on length of the prompt. You’ll receive a maximum of 3 points for content, 5 for oral fluency and 5 for pronunciation.

Repeat Sentence

                This tests your listening and speaking skills.

You’ll hear a 3-9 second recording and you must recite what you heard, word for word in the same order. In this type also, you will receive 3 for content, 5 each for oral fluency and pronunciation.

Describe Image

  This tests your speaking skills.

You’ll see an image and you’ll have 25 seconds to prepare your response. You can use the erasable board to take notes. You must answer within 40 seconds and you will receive a maximum of 5 points each for content, oral fluency and pronunciation.

Re-tell Lecture

This tests your listening and speaking skills.

You’ll hear an audio of up to 90 seconds and will see an image related to the topic. Be ready with your erasable board to take notes because the audio will play straight away. After the audio finishes playing, you will have 10 seconds to prepare your response.

And in 40 seconds you must cover the key points discussed in the lecture. For this type also, you will receive 5 points for content, oral fluency and pronunciation.

Answer Short Question

This tests your listening skills.

You’ll hear a 3-9 second audio where you will be asked a question and you must answer with a single word or a few words in 10 seconds. You will receive 1 point for each correct word.

PTE Writing

Summarise Written Text

This tests your reading and writing skills.

In this question type, you need to read a text of up to 300 words. In 10 minutes, you must write a 1 sentence response of no more than 75 words. To get the maximum marks possible, your sentence must include main points of the given text. You will receive 2 marks each for content, grammar, vocabulary and 1 for formal requirements, like the tone and quality of your response.

Written Essay

This tests your writing skill.

Here, you will be given a topic to write about and you’ll have 20 minutes to write a 200-300-word argumentative essay on the topic.

In the 20 minutes, you must plan, write and proofread the essay. Thus, time management is important. You will receive a maximum of 3 points for content, 2 each for the formal requirements, development, structure, coherence, grammar, linguistic range, vocabulary and if there are no spelling errors in your answer, you will receive another 2 points.