CELPIP Speaking Criteria: The Four Scored Areas
Four criteria, applied to all eight answers as a set rather than one at a time. Here is what each of them actually measures, and the hardest speaking test here to be measured on.
CELPIP speaking is scored on four criteria, and the score is a product of all eight answers together. One outstanding task will not carry a weak set, and one poor task will not sink a strong one. Knowing which criterion you are losing marks in is the difference between practice that improves your band and practice that repeats it.
Content and Coherence
How many ideas you produced, how good they are, how they are organised, and how well each is supported. This is where an answer that lists five thin points loses to one that develops two, and it is the criterion most exposed by the ninety-second tasks, where unstructured speech turns into repetition.
Vocabulary
Choice, suitability, range and precision. Precision comes first. A common word used exactly outscores a rare word used approximately, and a rare word used wrongly costs marks twice, here and in Listenability. Task 8 leans on this criterion harder than any other task, because describing an object you cannot name is a pure precision problem.
Listenability
Rhythm, pronunciation, intonation, pauses and self-correction, grammar and sentence variety, judged by how much effort a listener has to make. This is the criterion that punishes memorised scripts, because recitation has the wrong rhythm, and it is the one that makes restarting a sentence expensive.
Task Fulfillment
Relevance, completeness, tone and length. The most mechanical of the four, and therefore the cheapest to protect. Answer the question that was asked, cover everything the prompt named, use the register the situation requires, and fill the window. On Task 8 that includes asking the closing question, and on Task 6 it includes choosing a listener and staying with them.
The 8 questions on Test 16
Test 16 is the hardest speaking test on this site, and every task puts you somewhere uncomfortable.
Your cousin wants to lend a large sum of his savings to a friend who is starting a business, and nothing has been put in writing. He has asked what you think he should consider before he agrees.
Tests: Content and Coherence. Ninety seconds needs two developed considerations, not a list of worries.
Talk about a time you kept going with something that turned out to be much harder than you expected: a course, a job, a renovation, or a personal goal. Describe what happened and what kept you at it.
Tests: Listenability. A long-running story is where candidates restart sentences, and restarts are heard.
Describe the picture to someone who cannot see it. It is a street construction site with an open trench, orange barriers, an excavator, a flagger and blocked sidewalks.
Tests: Vocabulary precision. Trench, barrier, flagger. The scene supplies its own exact words if you reach for them.
In this picture, what do you think will most probably happen next? It is the same construction site.
Tests: modality. The flagger and the blocked sidewalks give you two predictions about people rather than machines.
Choose between a bursary for two students and rebuilding the hall kitchen. The treasurer is suggesting the whole amount go into a savings fund instead. Persuade the treasurer that what you chose is more suitable.
Tests: Task Fulfillment. Persuading a treasurer to spend rather than save requires the register as well as the reasons.
Your basement tenant Adaeze has paid rent late three months running and has just lost her job. Your mortgage comes out of that rent and the next payment is due in nine days. She has been a careful tenant for four years and has nowhere else to go.
Tests: tone under real pressure. Both people are sympathetic and the deadline is nine days.
Do you think that large companies should be required by law to publish how much waste they produce? Explain your reasons.
Tests: Content and Coherence over ninety seconds, with a concession about cost or usefulness that has to be answered.
At a storage locker auction, with no catalogue and no photographs allowed, you have two minutes to decide on a tall thin steel stand on a round base, with a swivelling round mirror, a rubber-jawed clamp and a red bulb. Call your neighbour Genevieve, describe it, and ask whether it is safe to use.
Tests: Vocabulary and Task Fulfillment together. Four unusual parts to name precisely, then the closing question.
CELPIP Speaking format: the eight tasks
| Task | Preparation | Speaking time |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Giving AdviceAdvise one named person on a decision | 30 sec | 90 sec |
| 2. Talking about a Personal ExperienceTell one story from your own life | 30 sec | 60 sec |
| 3. Describing a SceneDescribe a picture to someone who cannot see it | 30 sec | 60 sec |
| 4. Making PredictionsSay what happens next in the same picture | 30 sec | 60 sec |
| 5. Comparing and PersuadingChoose in a silent 60 sec, then argue for it | 60 sec | 60 sec |
| 6. Dealing with a Difficult SituationPick a listener, then resolve it | 60 sec | 60 sec |
| 7. Expressing OpinionsTake a side on a general question | 30 sec | 90 sec |
| 8. Describing an Unusual SituationDescribe an unnamed object, then ask | 30 sec | 60 sec |
| Total | 8 tasks | About 15 min |
How the four criteria become a band
Every answer is recorded, transcribed and assessed on all four criteria, and your level is a product of the whole set rather than an average of eight separate scores. The report returns feedback per criterion and an estimated CLB level from 1 to 12. The CELPIP speaking score chart sets out the descriptors band by band.
Free, all eight tasks recorded on the exam clock, with feedback per criterion.
FAQs
What are the CELPIP speaking criteria?
Four: Content and Coherence, Vocabulary, Listenability and Task Fulfillment. All eight recorded answers are assessed on all four, and your level is a product of the whole set rather than an average of eight separate marks.
What does Listenability mean in CELPIP speaking?
How much effort a listener has to make: rhythm, pronunciation, intonation, pauses and self-correction, grammar and sentence variety. It is the criterion that penalises memorised answers, because recitation has a rhythm of its own.
What is Task Fulfillment?
Relevance, completeness, tone and length. It asks whether you answered the question that was actually asked, covered everything the prompt named, used the register the situation required, and used the time. It is the most mechanical criterion and the cheapest to protect.
Does one bad task ruin my speaking score?
No. The band is a product of all eight answers together, so a single weak task does not sink the set. Equally, one excellent task will not carry seven weak ones.
What is on speaking test 16?
Eight tasks rated Hard: advice about lending savings with nothing in writing, a story about persisting at something harder than expected, a street construction site to describe and predict, a bursary or a hall kitchen argued against a savings fund, a tenant who has just lost her job with your mortgage due in nine days, an opinion on publishing corporate waste figures, and an unnamed steel stand at a storage locker auction.