IELTS Reading Library
Free · No sign-up · Print at home

Print a paper and sit it the way the real one is sat.

Every paper here can be downloaded as a question booklet laid out like the printed test, with a separate answer sheet you fill in by hand. Doing it on paper puts back the three things a screen removes: you have to write the answers, you have to copy them onto the sheet, and the Reading test gives you no extra time to do the copying. A candidate who has only ever practised on a screen usually discovers that on the day.

01

Start with the answer sheet

Academic Reading answer sheet

One page, forty numbered lines, a column for marking and the band table printed at the foot. Print several. The same sheet works with every paper in the library.

Download the answer sheet PDF · 1 page
01

Print the question booklet and one answer sheet. Do not print the answer key yet.

02

Set a timer for sixty minutes and start. Write every answer on the sheet, not in the booklet.

03

Stop at sixty minutes exactly, whatever is unfinished. Nothing after the hour counts.

04

Now open the answer file. Mark it, convert the score, and read the explanation for every question you missed or guessed.

02

What is in each file

The question booklet

Cover with the instructions to candidates, then the three passages and all forty questions in the order they are sat. Around ten to twelve pages. Diagrams and figures are printed as drawn.

The answer sheet

Separate, as in the real administration, because transferring answers is part of the task being tested. One sheet per attempt.

Answers and explanations

The key with every accepted spelling, the trap mechanism behind each item and the paragraph the answer lives in, the score-to-band table, and then the full written explanation of all forty questions.

Same content as on screen

These are generated from the papers themselves, so a printed paper and the on-screen version are never out of step. Do one on paper and the other on screen without repeating a question.

03

All fifty papers

#PaperSit itMark it
01 Ice, Queues and Inventors Question paper Answers & explanations
02 Tunnels, Tree Rings and Targets Question paper Answers & explanations
03 Containers, Birdsong and Forecasts Question paper Answers & explanations
04 Shells, Witnesses and Maps Question paper Answers & explanations
05 Eels, Counting and Failure Question paper Answers & explanations
06 Saffron, Strangers and Amateurs Question paper Answers & explanations
07 Glass, Maps and Ruins Question paper Answers & explanations
08 Triangles, Placebos and Interviews Question paper Answers & explanations
09 Seeds, Clocks and Journeys Question paper Answers & explanations
10 Rubber, Ridges and Dictionaries Question paper Answers & explanations
11 Gears, Feathers and Filters Question paper Answers & explanations
12 Concrete, Resistance and Marks Question paper Answers & explanations
13 Paper, Swarms and Repairs Question paper Answers & explanations
14 Matches, Deep Time and Novels Question paper Answers & explanations
15 Clones, Colonies and Labels Question paper Answers & explanations
16 Canals, Consonants and Pilots Question paper Answers & explanations
17 Noons, Octopuses and Offices Question paper Answers & explanations
18 Dykes, Lead and Prediction Question paper Answers & explanations
19 Converters, Ants and Survivors Question paper Answers & explanations
20 Elms, Sleep and Checklists Question paper Answers & explanations
21 Nitrogen, Colour and Libraries Question paper Answers & explanations
22 Sewers, Seismograms and Hindsight Question paper Answers & explanations
23 Cartouches, Signals and Speakers Question paper Answers & explanations
24 Smallpox, Tree Rings and Experts Question paper Answers & explanations
25 Cod, Compasses and Anecdotes Question paper Answers & explanations
26 Cables, Rubber Hands and Species Question paper Answers & explanations
27 Metres, Neurons and Slack Question paper Answers & explanations
28 Dust, Ulcers and Buildings Question paper Answers & explanations
29 Forecasts, Counting and Questions Question paper Answers & explanations
30 Type, Prions and Plain Words Question paper Answers & explanations
31 Longitude, Vents and Meetings Question paper Answers & explanations
32 Rivers, Ozone and Translation Question paper Answers & explanations
33 Clocks, Continents and Advice Question paper Answers & explanations
34 Needlework, Exoplanets and Rules Question paper Answers & explanations
35 Canals, Tolerance and Intervals Question paper Answers & explanations
36 Lamps, Neurons and Apologies Question paper Answers & explanations
37 Heat, Light and Consent Question paper Answers & explanations
38 Pallets, Traditions and Deadlines Question paper Answers & explanations
39 Tulips, Distances and Novelty Question paper Answers & explanations
40 Shrines, Dinosaurs and Averages Question paper Answers & explanations
41 Grids, Resistance and Practice Question paper Answers & explanations
42 Canals, Bees and Defaults Question paper Answers & explanations
43 Scrolls, Currents and Copies Question paper Answers & explanations
44 Stars, Scurvy and Species Question paper Answers & explanations
45 Letters, Ice Ages and Rules Question paper Answers & explanations
46 Load Lines, Ears and Trials Question paper Answers & explanations
47 Bar Codes, Trees and Certainty Question paper Answers & explanations
48 Firemarks, Neutrinos and Second Opinions Question paper Answers & explanations
49 Domesday, Hydrogen and Boots Question paper Answers & explanations
50 Locks, Migrations and Costs Question paper Answers & explanations