CELPIP Speaking Course
Build clear, well-structured answers for all eight CELPIP speaking tasks with timing drills and recorded practice routines.
Free to read. Create a free account to record answers and get them scored.
About this course
CELPIP Speaking is a solo, computer-delivered test — there's no examiner nodding along, no back-and-forth to lean on, just a microphone, a countdown timer, and eight distinct tasks in a row. That format is unfamiliar to most learners, and unfamiliarity costs more marks than weak grammar does. This course treats the format itself as something to practice, alongside the language skills underneath it.
Each of the eight tasks gets its own lesson, in the order they appear on the test: giving advice, a personal experience, describing a scene, making predictions, comparing and persuading, dealing with a difficult situation, expressing opinions, and describing an unusual situation. Every lesson gives you a response structure you can internalize and adapt on the fly, plus guidance on the four dimensions CELPIP raters assess: Content/Coherence, Vocabulary, Listenability, and Task Fulfillment. Listenability is about how easily a listener can follow you, not your accent.
Throughout the course you'll build a bank of flexible sentence starters and transition phrases so you're never sitting in silence during prep time, and you'll practice speaking against the exact per-task time limits so pacing becomes automatic. The later lessons focus on recovering gracefully from a stumble mid-answer and on the small delivery habits — pacing, stress, self-correction — that make a response sound confident even under a countdown clock.
The 8 Speaking tasks at a glance
| Task | What you do | Prep | Speak |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1. Giving Advice | Advise someone facing a decision | 30 s | 90 s |
| 2. Talking about a Personal Experience | Tell a specific story from your life | 30 s | 60 s |
| 3. Describing a Scene | Describe a picture to someone who can't see it | 30 s | 60 s |
| 4. Making Predictions | Say what will happen next in the same picture | 30 s | 60 s |
| 5. Comparing and Persuading | Choose one of two options, then persuade a family member your choice beats a new option they suggest | 60 + 60 s | 60 s |
| 6. Dealing with a Difficult Situation | Choose one of two people to speak to, and handle the problem tactfully | 60 s | 60 s |
| 7. Expressing Opinions | Take a position and defend it | 30 s | 90 s |
| 8. Describing an Unusual Situation | Describe an unusual object to someone on the phone | 30 s | 60 s |
The whole Speaking test takes ~15–20 min. Source: celpip.ca, checked September 30, 2026.
The Celpip Plus team
Written and reviewed against the official CELPIP scoring criteria
Questions about this course
Yes. Every lesson is free to read. A free account lets you record answers on the practice screen and get your first responses scored.
Tasks 1 and 7 give you 30 seconds to prepare and 90 seconds to speak. Tasks 2, 3, 4 and 8 give you 30 seconds to prepare and 60 seconds to speak. Task 6 gives you 60 seconds to prepare and 60 seconds to speak. Task 5 adds a 60-second choice before its own 60 seconds to prepare and 60 seconds to speak.
Raters score four things: Content/Coherence, Vocabulary, Listenability and Task Fulfillment. Your result is a CELPIP level from 1 to 12, which maps to the same CLB level for IRCC.
About an hour to read all 15 lessons. Plan on a week or two if you practise each task after its lesson.
Express Entry's Federal Skilled Worker program needs at least CLB 7 in every skill. CLB 9 earns noticeably more points. Check your own scores with our free CELPIP to CLB calculator.