AcademIELTS Original — Listening Test 2

• Each audio plays once. You CANNOT pause or rewind during the exam.
• Take notes on the question section as you listen.
• After audio ends, you have 10 minutes to review and finalize answers.

AcademIELTS Original — Listening Test 2 is a brand-new paper modelled on the official format, useful for candidates who have already worked through the Cambridge series and want unseen material. Section 1 features an enrolment dialogue for a class or course; Section 2 moves into a welcome talk introducing a venue to visitors; Section 3 shifts into a supervision discussion about a dissertation; and Section 4 closes with a lecture on bees and pollination.

Section 1 uses form completion; Section 2 uses multiple choice plus map labelling; Section 3 uses multiple choice plus matching; Section 4 uses note completion. Section 3's distractor lines often come from the second speaker correcting the first, so listen for hesitations like 'actually' or 'on second thoughts' as a signal that the answer has just changed.

Read the preview gaps backwards from the last to the first — this forces you to notice the late-section cues that students normally miss. Pencil rough answers and circle anything you doubted, then resolve those during transfer. Watch your word limits: a four-word answer in a NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS task is automatically wrong. Steady, methodical work earns a clean band 7.

New to this skill? Read the Listening question types guide for tactics, scoring rules, and frequency analysis across Cambridge 10–20. Or browse all Listening practice tests.

Looking for written strategy? See the IELTS Blog for in-depth posts.