Recording your own voice is uncomfortable, which makes speaking practice easy to put off. This page exists to get that discomfort over with early, when it still costs you nothing.
All eight speaking tasks are here, from giving advice through to describing a scene and making predictions. Open a task above, pick an exercise, and you get the prompt and a recorder. Speak your response, play it back, and re-record as many times as you like before committing to a version.
Submit the recording when you are ready and it comes back with a score and written feedback on the response you actually gave - not the sharper one you had in mind while speaking.
The playback is worth as much as the score. Filler words, false starts, a rushed final sentence: these are almost impossible to notice from the inside and obvious the moment you hear them back. Catching one early is what stops it hardening into a habit you carry into the exam. One more thing worth doing early: practise saying the response out loud rather than rehearsing it in your head. The two are not the same, and only one of them is what the exam records.
Recordings marked FREE need no subscription, and Pro opens the rest of the speaking set.
CELPIP Speaking Practice: the full guide
What is the CELPIP Speaking test format?
CELPIP Speaking is eight tasks in 15 to 20 minutes. Each one gives you a short preparation window, then opens a recording window that closes on its own. There is no second take, and no way to hear yourself back and start again.
You speak into a headset in a room with other candidates doing the same thing. That is worth knowing in advance: the first time most people hear themselves being recorded next to a stranger is on test day, and it costs them Task 1.
CELPIP Speaking: the eight tasks, with prep and response time
Task
Preparation
Response
Task 1 - Giving Advice
30 seconds
90 seconds
Task 2 - Talking about a Personal Experience
30 seconds
60 seconds
Task 3 - Describing a Scene
30 seconds
60 seconds
Task 4 - Making Predictions
30 seconds
60 seconds
Task 5 - Comparing and Persuading
60 seconds
60 seconds
Task 6 - Dealing with a Difficult Situation
60 seconds
60 seconds
Task 7 - Expressing Opinions
30 seconds
90 seconds
Task 8 - Describing an Unusual Situation
30 seconds
60 seconds
Preparation and response windows as the exam defines them - the same values our timed player runs on.
How many tasks are on the CELPIP Speaking test?
Eight, and they are not interchangeable. Two of them - Comparing and Persuading, and Dealing with a Difficult Situation - give you 60 seconds of preparation rather than 30, which is the exam telling you they need a plan. Two others, Giving Advice and Expressing Opinions, give you 90 seconds to speak rather than 60.
Tasks 3 and 4 run back to back on the same image: 60 seconds describing what is happening, then 30 seconds of preparation and 60 more in which you must predict rather than describe. Rehearsing one pivot sentence you trust makes that turn almost automatic.
Where can I take a free CELPIP Speaking practice test with answers?
On this page. Every part of CELPIP Speaking above has free exercises, they need no card, and you can start without an account. You get the prompt and a recorder, and you can re-record as many times as you like before submitting - which is the one thing the real sitting will never allow, so use it early and then stop.
Being straight about the limit: the free set is a sample of each part rather than the whole bank, and full-length timed mock tests are a Pro feature. What you can do for nothing is work every part type, see the answer key, and find out where you actually stand before deciding whether to pay.
Try a sample CELPIP Speaking task
Here is a Task 1 prompt in the exam's shape, with what the marker is listening for. Written for this page, not taken from a real test.
Prompt - 30 seconds to prepare, 90 seconds to speak
A friend has been offered a job in another city. The pay is better, but they would be moving away from family and would need to start within a month. Give your friend advice about what to do.
What is the marker actually listening for?
Answer: Commitment. A weak response lists considerations - money, family, timing - and never advises anything. The task says give advice, so Task Fulfillment requires you to land on one: take it, or do not, or take it on a stated condition. Then support it with two reasons and, if you have time left, acknowledge the obvious objection. The 90-second window is long enough that trailing off at 50 seconds is noticeable, so it is worth having a closing sentence ready. Speak at your normal pace: rushing to fill the time hurts Listenability more than a short pause ever does.
How is CELPIP Speaking scored?
On four criteria: Content and Coherence, Vocabulary, Listenability, and Task Fulfillment. Accent is not one of them, and does not affect your score - Listenability is about whether you are easy to follow, which is pace, stress and structure rather than sounding Canadian.
Submit a recording here and it is transcribed and scored on what you actually said, coming back with an estimated level and feedback per criterion. The recording itself is not stored. Playback is worth as much as the score: filler words and false starts are nearly impossible to notice from the inside and obvious the moment you hear them back. Scores run from 1 to 12 on a scale aligned to the Canadian Language Benchmarks. What you need depends on why you are sitting the exam - IRCC publishes the current minimums, and those are the numbers to work back from.
Frequently asked questions
No. The criterion is Listenability - whether a listener can follow you comfortably - not how close you sound to a particular accent. Pace, clear stress and a structure the listener can follow are what move that score.
No. Each task records once, and the window closes on its own. That is why the re-record you get in practice here is worth using early in your preparation and then deliberately giving up.
Nothing stops, and the silence is recorded. Finishing 30 seconds early on a 90-second task reads as an incomplete answer, so it is worth preparing a closing sentence you can expand or trim to fill the window naturally.
No - 30 seconds is not enough to write anything you could read naturally, and reading aloud is audible. Use the window to decide your position and your first sentence; those two are what stop a shaky start.
Yes, the eight tasks come in a fixed order, which is a real advantage: you know that Tasks 3 and 4 share an image and that Task 5 gives you longer to prepare. Practising in that order builds the pacing you will actually need.