This post details IELTS Listening in detail. Many students flounder when it comes to listening and especially IELTS Listening they are clueless on how to approach the test and score well. 

The
task achievement Enrol for IELTS Academic course with Srishti. Easy enrolment and instant access here
in IELTS Listening poses innumerable challenges such as being able to listen and answer at the same time. Students are seldom prepared of using their listening skills to parallely respond to questions and that too respond correctly to get high scores.

Here, we focus upon demystifying few of the listening skills students should improve through a detailed coverage of IELTS Listening question types.. For finer nuances and techniques you should consider enrolling for Engramm's IELTS course

Do remember these about IELTS Listening

IELTS Listening 'Must-knows'

  • IELTS Listening is the same for IELTS General and IELTS Academic.
  • IELTS Listening test has 4 parts, each with 10 questions,
  • IELTS Listening test takes anywhere between 30 to 40 minutes to complete
  • The audio will be played only once
  • In the paper-based IELTS test, you will be given 10 minutes after the recording ends to transfer the responses to the answer-sheet
  • In the computer-based IELTS test, Listening responses ends when the audio of all 4 section is played once
[wptb id=27821]

While the core of IELTS Listening test is to evaluate your listening ability, but the various types of questions are included in the test to evaluate your listening levels. 

Here are the 6 types of questions that you will encounter in your IELTS Listening test

  • Multiple Choice
  • Matching
  • Diagram
  • Fill a form or a table
  • Complete a sentence
  • Short answers

Note: One test paper may not contain all types of questions listed above. 

Type of Questions and their detailed descriptions

Let us understand each type of question and the expected response

  • Multiple choice:  You will be required to choose the right letter from amongst the choices
  • Matching: Here too, you will need to choose the correct letter from a list of matches provided
  • Diagram: Here again, you will need to choose the correct letter or sometimes a word/ words that you will hear in the audio that is played
  • Fill a form or a table: Here you will need to fill in a word or number depending on the blank that you will see
  • Complete a sentence: As is obvious from the type of question, you will be required to complete a sentence with word(s) and/or number(s)
  • Short answers: You will be required to fill in with word(s) and/or number(s)

The best way to improve your listening skills

  • Though you may be fluent in English language, you should start practicing to listen to those ‘unsaid words’
  • Do NOT complete the sentence before it is spoken to you/ heard by you 

Listening towards IELTS Listening goals

Day-1: Watch an English movie in  YouTube. Note: The movie should be Captions enabled and watch the movie from 11th minute (11:00:00) till the 20th minute (19:59:59). Add the movie to your favourites

Day-2: Watch the same movie from 11:00:00 to 19:59:59, Note: Today, you should MUTE the audio

Day-3: Watch the same movie from 11:00:00 to 19:59:59 Note: This day, you should DISABLE CAPTIONS and enable AUDIO

Day-4: Watch the movie from the beginning and when it reaches the 11th minute, LISTEN as well as SPEAK along with the movie till 19:59:59

More Help with your IELTS General Test

IELTS Writing Task-2 – Latest sample

IELTS Academic Writing Task-1 – Latest sample

IELTS General Reading – Latest Tips and Tricks. Here and here

IELTS General Writing – Sample Band-9 Essay – January 2022

IELTS General Speaking – Band-9 Sample – January 2022

IELTS General Listening – Tips – January 2022

Price Based Country test mode enabled for testing India. You should do tests on private browsing mode. Browse in private with Firefox, Chrome and Safari

Scroll to Top