A2–C2 · PTE Academic
PTE Academic Practice Test 32
AI-generated practice paper in the style of PTE Academic — original material, not a reproduction of any real exam paper, following the official task types. Listening audio is read aloud by your browser's voice. For Speaking you can record yourself and compare with a model answer, and Writing tasks include a model answer — neither is scored automatically, since that needs real speech and writing evaluation this site does not offer for this exam.
Speaking
Read Aloud
Look at the text below. In 30 seconds, you must read this text aloud as naturally and clearly as possible.
The human heart beats about one hundred thousand times a day, pumping blood through a network of vessels that would stretch over ninety thousand kilometres if laid end to end. Regular exercise strengthens the heart muscle, allowing it to pump more blood with each beat and lowering the resting pulse.
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Model answer: Say the numbers clearly: "one hundred thousand" and "ninety thousand kilometres". Pause after "day" and after "vessels". Stress "laid end to end" as a fixed phrase. In the second sentence, emphasise "strengthens" and "lowering" and fall on "pulse".
Microplastics are tiny fragments less than five millimetres across, produced when larger items break down or when synthetic clothing is washed. They have been found in oceans, rivers, drinking water and even human blood. Although the health effects remain uncertain, researchers are calling for stricter limits on plastic production.
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Model answer: Pronounce "microplastics" and "synthetic" carefully. Pause after "across" and after "washed". List "oceans, rivers, drinking water and even human blood" with rising tone until "even", which deserves stress. Pause after "uncertain" and close on "plastic production" with a falling tone.
Repeat Sentence
You will hear a sentence. Please repeat the sentence exactly as you hear it.
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Model answer: Please leave your coats in the cloakroom.
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Model answer: Glass is made by heating sand to a very high temperature.
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Model answer: A number of students have asked for an extension of the deadline.
Describe Image
Describe the image in detail.
Look at the image below. In 25 seconds, prepare, then describe in detail what the image is showing. You will have 40 seconds to speak.
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Model answer: The chart illustrates the average number of hours people of different ages spend on screens each day. Teenagers aged 14 to 17 spend the most time, at 7.5 hours, while children aged 6 to 9 spend the least, at 2.5 hours. After the teenage peak, screen time falls steadily with age, reaching 3.3 hours for people over 65. The pattern is clearly a rise to adolescence followed by a gradual decline.
Re-tell Lecture
Listen to the lecture and retell it.
Listen to the lecture. Then retell it in your own words. You will have 40 seconds to speak.
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Model answer: The lecture explains that medieval painting arranged figures by symbolic importance rather than realistic space, until Brunelleschi and Alberti developed mathematical linear perspective in the early fifteenth century, using a vanishing point to create convincing depth. Painters like Masaccio adopted it, marking Renaissance art's shift toward accurately observing and representing the physical world.
Answer Short Question
You will hear a question. Type your answer in one or a few words.
1. Type what you hear.
2. Type what you hear.
3. Type what you hear.
4. Type what you hear.
Summarize Group Discussion
Listen to a group discussion and summarise it.
Listen to the discussion. Then summarise it, covering each speaker's main point. You will have 70 seconds to speak.
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Model answer: Ben argues asteroid mining needs international regulation before extraction begins, to avoid a legal vacuum. Carla notes current space law is ambiguous about private resource extraction. David compares the risk to unregulated resource grabs on Earth. They agree an international oversight body, modeled on deep-sea mining regulation, should be established now, before commercial mining creates entrenched resistance to rules.
Respond to a Situation
Listen to the situation and respond as if you were in it.
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Model answer: I ordered this cake with a specific name written clearly in my order, but the icing spells it incorrectly, and unfortunately my event starts in just one hour. Is there any way you could quickly fix just the writing, or offer me a discount since I'll now need to present it exactly as it is.
Writing
Summarize Written Text
Read the passage and write a one-sentence summary.
Beneath a forest floor lies a network that few walkers ever notice. Most trees form partnerships with mycorrhizal fungi, whose fine threads envelop or penetrate the tree's roots and extend far into the surrounding soil. The fungus absorbs water and minerals, particularly phosphorus, that the roots could not reach alone, and in return receives sugars produced by the tree through photosynthesis. Because a single fungus can connect the roots of many trees, the threads form what has been popularly called the wood wide web. Laboratory and field experiments have shown that carbon and nutrients can travel through these connections, and some researchers have suggested that large, established trees deliberately nurture their seedlings by supplying them with sugars, helping the young plants survive in deep shade. Warning signals, in the form of chemical compounds, may also pass between plants attacked by insects. These claims have captured public imagination, inspiring novels and documentaries, but a number of ecologists now urge caution. They point out that the evidence for deliberate cooperation is thin, that transferred amounts are often small, and that a passive flow of resources may simply reflect the fungus's own interests. Whatever the ultimate interpretation, there is broad agreement that mycorrhizal fungi are fundamental to forest health, which has practical consequences for logging and replanting practices that disturb the soil.
Read the passage and summarise it in ONE sentence of no more than 75 words.
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Model answer: Mycorrhizal fungi link trees' roots in an underground network that exchanges nutrients for sugars, and although popular claims that trees deliberately help one another are disputed by some ecologists, these fungi are undoubtedly vital to forest health and should influence how forests are managed.
Write Essay
Write an essay of about 200-300 words on the topic.
Some parents and teachers believe that primary school children should not be given homework, arguing that free time is more valuable at that age. To what extent do you agree?
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Model answer: The question of whether young children should do homework divides parents and educators, and I largely agree that primary schools should keep it to a minimum.
Those who defend homework argue that short, regular practice reinforces what is taught in class and builds habits of responsibility that will matter later in a child's education. A few minutes of reading or simple arithmetic each evening, they suggest, need not be burdensome and can involve parents in their child's learning.
Nevertheless, the evidence for academic benefit at this age is weak, and the costs are easy to overlook. Young children need unstructured play to develop imagination, social skills and physical coordination, and evenings are often already filled with family time, sport or rest. Homework can turn into a source of conflict between parents and children, particularly when a tired child is asked to complete a worksheet after a full day at school. Furthermore, children whose parents cannot help with schoolwork, whether through lack of time, confidence or language, are placed at an unfair disadvantage compared with peers who receive extra support at home.
For these reasons, I believe primary schools should largely replace formal homework with voluntary reading for pleasure and occasional, brief practical tasks. Structured learning should stay inside the school day, where a trained teacher, not an exhausted parent, is available to guide it, leaving evenings for the play and rest that young children need.
Reading
Reading & Writing: Fill in the Blanks
Select the best word for each blank.
In 1928, the biologist Alexander Fleming noticed that a mould had accidentally one of his laboratory dishes, killing the bacteria growing around it. Rather than discarding the dish, Fleming investigated further and identified the active substance, which he named penicillin after the mould that it. For more than a decade, however, the discovery remained largely a laboratory curiosity, since nobody had worked out how to the substance in large enough quantities to treat patients. During the Second World War, a team of British and American researchers finally developed methods to mass-produce the drug, it to save the lives of countless wounded soldiers. Penicillin's success inspired a wider search for other antibiotics, transforming the treatment of bacterial infection a single generation.
Multiple Choice, Choose Multiple Answers
Read the text and select all the correct answers.
As international trade, travel and digital media have connected the world more closely than ever before, some cultural commentators warn that increasing exposure to a small number of dominant global brands, films and platforms is gradually eroding local traditions and languages, producing a more homogeneous global culture in which regional differences slowly fade. Others argue that this concern is overstated, pointing out that globalization has also made it dramatically easier for local music, cuisine and art forms to reach international audiences that would have been entirely inaccessible a generation ago, and that many communities have responded to global influence not by abandoning their traditions but by deliberately adapting and reasserting them in new, hybrid forms. Researchers studying specific cases have found mixed evidence: some smaller languages have indeed declined sharply as younger generations shift toward more widely spoken ones associated with economic opportunity, while certain local culinary and artistic traditions have instead grown stronger and more internationally visible precisely because of increased global attention and demand. This suggests that globalization's cultural effects are neither uniformly destructive nor uniformly beneficial, but vary considerably depending on the specific tradition, community and circumstances involved.
1. Which TWO statements are supported by the passage?
Re-order Paragraphs
Click the sentences to put them in the correct order.
2. Put the paragraph in the correct order.
Reading: Fill in the Blanks
Choose the best word for each blank.
Microfinance institutions provide small loans to entrepreneurs, often in developing countries, who lack the collateral or credit history typically by conventional banks. Proponents argue that even a modest loan can allow a person to buy the equipment or materials needed to a small business, generating income that would otherwise remain out of reach. Because borrowers are frequently organised into small groups who guarantee one another's loans, repayment rates have historically been high compared with conventional unsecured lending. Critics, however, warn that some microfinance schemes charge interest rates high enough to borrowers in a cycle of debt rather than lifting them out of poverty. Researchers continue to debate how much microfinance genuinely poverty over the long term, as opposed to simply providing short-term relief.
Multiple Choice, Choose Single Answer
Read the text and choose the best answer.
The term digital divide refers to the persistent gap between individuals and communities that have reliable, affordable access to modern digital technology and high-speed internet connections, and those who lack such access due to factors including geographic location, income, age or disability. Although internet access has expanded dramatically worldwide over the past two decades, significant disparities remain, with people in rural or remote areas often facing considerably higher costs and less reliable connections than those in major urban centres, where telecommunications infrastructure investment has historically been concentrated. The consequences of this divide extend well beyond simple inconvenience, since access to reliable digital technology has become increasingly essential for accessing quality education, applying for employment opportunities, and reaching many essential government and healthcare services that have moved substantially online in recent years. During recent periods when schools and workplaces shifted rapidly and extensively to remote operation, the practical consequences of the digital divide became especially visible, as students and workers without adequate home internet access or a suitable personal device struggled considerably to fully participate. Governments and organisations in many countries have since launched initiatives specifically aimed at expanding affordable broadband access and providing subsidised devices to underserved communities.
3. What is the main idea of the passage?
Listening
Summarize Spoken Text
Listen to the recording, then write a summary.
Transcript (available after checking)
Solar and wind power have a well-known weakness: the sun doesn't always shine and the wind doesn't always blow. That's why energy storage is so important for the transition away from fossil fuels. Large lithium-ion battery installations can absorb surplus electricity when generation is high and release it in the evening, when demand peaks. Costs have fallen dramatically, by roughly ninety percent over the last decade, so batteries are now competitive in many markets. They also respond within milliseconds to sudden changes on the grid, which helps keep the frequency stable. However, batteries typically store energy for a few hours, not for days or weeks. For longer periods, engineers are developing alternatives, including pumped hydroelectric storage, where water is moved uphill and released later, and hydrogen produced from surplus renewable power. A reliable clean grid will probably need a combination of these technologies.
Write a summary of the lecture in 50–70 words.
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Model answer: Because renewable generation is intermittent, storage is essential, and grid batteries, whose costs have fallen sharply, absorb surplus power and release it at peak times while stabilising the grid. They only store energy for hours, so longer-term options such as pumped hydro and hydrogen will also be needed for a reliable clean grid.
Multiple Choice, Choose Multiple Answers
Listen and select all the correct answers.
Transcript (available after checking)
A rainbow appears when sunlight enters a raindrop, bends as it slows down inside the water, reflects off the back of the drop, and bends again on its way out, splitting into its component colours because each wavelength bends by a slightly different amount. Red light bends least and appears on the outer edge of the arc, while violet bends most and appears on the inner edge. Because this only works at a very specific angle relative to the sun and the observer's eye, a rainbow is really a personal phenomenon: two people standing near each other are actually seeing light from different raindrops, and technically viewing two slightly different rainbows. This is also why a rainbow always appears opposite the sun, and why you can never walk up to one; as you move, the raindrops producing your particular rainbow change too, so it simply reappears elsewhere.
1. Which of the following does the speaker say about rainbows?
Fill in the Blanks
Listen to the recording and type the missing words.
Before mechanical refrigeration existed, people preserved food using salt, smoke, or by storing natural ice through summer in insulated . Practical mechanical refrigerators, which cool by compressing and expanding a that absorbs heat as it evaporates, developed through the nineteenth century, though early machines used toxic gases that occasionally caused deadly . Safer synthetic refrigerants made home refrigerators common, transforming diets by letting fresh food be kept for instead of hours. Some of those synthetic gases were later found to damage the ozone and have since been banned.
Highlight Correct Summary
Listen and choose the paragraph that best summarises the recording.
Transcript (available after checking)
Many plants rely on animals to carry their seeds away from the parent plant, since seeds that fall and germinate too close together would compete fiercely for the same limited light, water and nutrients. Fruit-bearing plants often wrap their seeds in a sweet, nutritious pulp specifically to encourage animals to eat the fruit, carry it some distance before the seed passes through digestion undamaged, and then deposit it, often conveniently fertilised by droppings, far from the parent plant. Other plants take a more targeted approach, producing small hooked burrs that cling to fur and get carried away accidentally, or seeds that squirrels and other rodents deliberately bury for later and then simply forget to retrieve, allowing an entirely new plant to grow undisturbed from that buried, forgotten cache.
2. Which paragraph best summarises the recording?
Multiple Choice, Choose Single Answer
Listen and choose the best answer.
Transcript (available after checking)
In some cities, residents who cannot install solar panels on their own roof, perhaps because they rent their home or live in an apartment building with unsuitable roof access, can still benefit from solar power by joining a community solar cooperative. Members collectively fund panels installed on a shared rooftop, such as a school or community centre, or occasionally a small nearby solar farm, and each receives credit on their electricity bill proportional to their share of the investment and the electricity generated. This model has let solar power reach many households otherwise excluded due to their housing situation.
3. Who does the lecture say particularly benefits from community solar cooperatives?
Select Missing Word
The recording ends with a beep. Choose the option that best completes it.
4. Choose the word or phrase that best completes the recording.
Highlight Incorrect Words
Listen to the recording and select the words in the text that differ from what you hear.
5. The text below differs from the recording in some words. Select the words that are DIFFERENT from what you hear. Ancient scrolls had to be entirely unrolled to reach any particular passage, which was slow and impractical for longer texts. The codex, a book bound along one edge with a sewn spine, allowed readers to turn directly to any page and eventually replaced the scroll almost completely for everyday reading, though scrolls still remained in ceremonial or formal use for centuries afterward.
Write from Dictation
Listen to the sentence and type it exactly as you hear it.
6. Type what you hear.
7. Type what you hear.
Keep your streak going
Up next: PTE Academic Practice Test 33