Raw score

0/40

Estimated band

–

By section

–

Estimated with the standard Listening conversion. Every question below now shows the correct answer and what confirmed it — and the full transcript is open at the bottom so you can trace anything you missed.

Try another test

Your browser has no English speech voices available, so the audio cannot play. Try Chrome or Edge on desktop, or check your system's text-to-speech settings.

IELTS Listening — Practice Test 10

0/40 answered

40:00

Section 1 A customer phones a furniture store to arrange the delivery of a wardrobe · Delivery clerk, Customer

Questions 1-7

Complete the form below. Write NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER for each answer.

1Customer surname: ______

NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER

2Mobile number: 07913 446 ______

NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER

3Address: Flat 2, 27 ______ Close

NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER

4Item to be delivered: ______ wardrobe

NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER

5Delivery day: ______

NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER

6Time of delivery: the ______

NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER

7Extra service booked: removal of the ______ (£15)

NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER

Questions 8-10

Answer the questions below. Write NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER for each answer.

8Where should the driver park the van?

NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER

9What will the customer move from the staircase before the delivery?

NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER

10How will the customer be told her two-hour delivery window?

NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER

Section 2 A project officer describes the restoration of a coastal footpath · Project officer

Questions 11-13

Choose the correct letter, A, B or C.

11According to Megan, what caused most of the damage to the path?

A the number of people walking on it B severe winter storms C farm vehicles crossing it

12Where does most of the project's money come from?

A a lottery grant B the local council C donations from businesses

13In the public consultation, what did people ask for most often?

A clearer signs B more litter bins C more places to sit

Questions 14-17

Where are the following places? Choose the correct letter, A–F, from the plan description below.

Plan of the Saltmere Coast Path — you are at the car park at the southern end; the path runs north along the coast to the harbour.

A = immediately next to the car park B = just beyond the wooden footbridge, on the seaward side C = on the headland, the highest point of the route D = on the landward side of the path, set back from the cliff E = at the northern end, beside the harbour wall F = behind the old lifeboat station

A immediately next to the car park
B just beyond the wooden footbridge, on the seaward side
C on the headland, the highest point of the route
D on the landward side of the path, set back from the cliff
E at the northern end, beside the harbour wall
F behind the old lifeboat station

14welcome shelter

15bird hide

16viewing platform

17tool store

Questions 18-20

Complete the sentences below. Write NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER for each answer.

18The steps at Craven Point will remain closed until the ______.

NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER

19Volunteers must bring their own ______.

NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER

20A weekly progress report is posted on the project ______.

NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER

Section 4 A lecture on animal navigation, focusing on sea turtles · Lecturer

Questions 31-40

Complete the notes below. Write NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS for each answer.

31Turtles sense both the strength of the magnetic field and its ______.

NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS

32Returning to breed at one's own birth beach is called ______.

NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS

33In experiments, hatchlings swam in tanks surrounded by magnetic ______.

NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS

34Most females nest within a few ______ of the place where they hatched.

NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS

35Popular belief: hatchlings find the sea by following the ______.

NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS

36In fact, hatchlings crawl towards the brightest ______.

NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS

37Because of street lighting, many hatchlings now head ______ instead of towards the sea.

NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS

38Disorientated hatchlings are killed by predators or die of ______.

NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS

39Disorientation falls sharply where towns install shielded ______ lights.

NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS

40The steel used in ______ may distort a beach's magnetic signature.

NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS

Audio script / transcript

Trace every answer back to the exact words. Distractors — changes of mind, corrections, rejected options — are part of the recording, so read the whole exchange, not just one line.

Section 1 — A customer phones a furniture store to arrange the delivery of a wardrobe

Delivery clerk:Good afternoon, Hartwell Furniture, deliveries desk, Chloe speaking. How can I help?

Customer:Oh, hello. I bought a wardrobe in your Milton Road branch on Saturday, and the assistant said I should ring this number to sort out the delivery.

Delivery clerk:That's right, I can do that now. Can I start with your name, please?

Customer:It's Laura Deighton.

Delivery clerk:Deighton... is that D-A-Y-T-O-N?

Customer:No, everyone writes it that way, but it's the old spelling — D-E-I-G-H-T-O-N.

Delivery clerk:D-E-I-G-H-T-O-N. Lovely. And a mobile number, in case the driver needs to reach you?

Customer:It's oh-seven-nine-one-three, double four, six... five, oh, nine. Hmm — no, hang on, sorry, I've given you the ending of my work phone. Mine finishes five-two-nine, not five-oh-nine. So oh-seven-nine-one-three, four-four-six, five-two-nine.

Delivery clerk:Zero seven nine one three, four four six, five two nine. Got it. And the delivery address?

Customer:It's Flat 2, number 27, Wyndham Close. Shall I spell the street? W-Y-N-D-H-A-M.

Delivery clerk:W-Y-N-D-H-A-M, Wyndham Close. Thank you. Now, the order itself — I can see two wardrobes on the Saturday list. Was yours the pine one?

Customer:No — I did look hard at the pine, but in the end I chose the oak one. It was the last display model, apparently.

Delivery clerk:The oak wardrobe, yes, here it is. Right, deliveries to your postcode go out on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Which suits you?

Customer:Thursday, please — ideally the morning, before I do the school run at lunchtime.

Delivery clerk:Let me look... I'm sorry, Thursday morning is completely full this week. I can offer you the Thursday afternoon instead, or the following Tuesday morning.

Customer:Oh. No, I don't want to wait another week — the afternoon will have to do. Thursday afternoon, then.

Delivery clerk:Thursday afternoon it is. Now, two optional extras. We have an assembly service — the drivers will build the wardrobe in the room you choose. That's forty pounds.

Customer:Forty? Mmm, it's tempting, but no — my brother's a joiner, he'll put it together for nothing. I'll skip that.

Delivery clerk:No problem. The other one is removal: for fifteen pounds the crew will take away your old wardrobe and recycle it.

Customer:Oh, now that I do want. The old wardrobe is enormous and I've no way of shifting it. Yes, add the removal, please.

Delivery clerk:Done — so that's the delivery plus fifteen pounds. Now, is there anything the driver should know about access?

Customer:Yes, quite a lot, actually. Wyndham Close itself is a dead end and there's never anywhere to stop. Drivers usually park round the corner in Bell Lane and carry things through the passage.

Delivery clerk:Park in Bell Lane, use the passage — I'll put that on the sheet. You said Flat 2. Is that ground floor?

Customer:First floor, and there's no lift, just the staircase. It's wide enough, but I keep plant pots on the steps — I'll move those before they come, otherwise there's no room to turn.

Delivery clerk:Please do — the crew can't lift over anything left on the stairs. Last thing: on the Thursday morning you'll get a text message giving you a two-hour window, so you're not waiting in all afternoon.

Customer:A text on the day — perfect. Thanks so much for your help, Chloe.

Delivery clerk:You're welcome, Ms Deighton. We'll see you Thursday.

Section 2 — A project officer describes the restoration of a coastal footpath

Project officer:Good morning, and welcome to the open day for the Saltmere Coast Path project. I'm Megan Ellis, the project officer, and I'll quickly explain what we're doing, where everything is, and how you can get involved.

Project officer:First, some history. Parts of the path between the car park and the harbour have been closed for nearly two years. People often assume it was worn out by the sheer number of walkers, and some locals blame the farm vehicles that used to cross it. In fact neither did the real harm: it was two winters of severe storms that tore out whole sections of the surface and brought the cliff edge back several metres.

Project officer:Now, the money. The council has put in a share, and local businesses have donated timber and stone. But the great bulk of the funding — about four-fifths of it — comes from a National Lottery grant awarded last spring. Without that, none of this would be happening.

Project officer:Before designing anything we ran a public consultation, and the results surprised us. A few people asked for better signs, and some wanted more litter bins. But by far the most common request — over half the forms we received — was for more seating, especially from older walkers with nowhere to rest on the whole three-mile stretch. So there will be twelve new benches along the route.

Project officer:Right, the plan you've been given. You're standing at the car park at the southern end, and the path runs north along the coast, finishing at the harbour. The first thing you'll see, immediately next to the car park, is the new welcome shelter, where the route maps are displayed.

Project officer:Follow the path north and you cross the wooden footbridge over the creek. Just beyond the footbridge, on the seaward side, we've rebuilt the bird hide, looking out over the mudflats — at low tide you'll see hundreds of waders from there.

Project officer:Further on, the path climbs to the headland, the highest point of the route. We had originally planned to rebuild the viewing platform up there, where the old one stood, but surveys showed the cliff edge has retreated too far, so the platform has been moved: it now sits on the landward side of the path, set back from the cliff, just before you reach the headland. The view is almost as good — and it will still be there in thirty years.

Project officer:At the far end, near the harbour, behind the old lifeboat station, we've set up the tool store, where our volunteers sign in and collect equipment.

Project officer:One disappointment. The flight of steps down to the beach at Craven Point was due to reopen this August, but our contractor found the rock face behind them is unstable, and that work can't be done while seabirds are nesting. So the steps will stay closed until the spring. Please don't climb the barriers — the drop is severe.

Project officer:Finally, volunteering. Work parties run every Wednesday and Saturday. All tools and gloves are provided — but you must bring your own boots, sturdy ones, because the ground is rough and often wet. And if you can't dig, you can still help: we post a progress report every week on the project blog, and sharing it genuinely helps our next funding application. Now — any questions?

Section 3 — Two students plan an episode of their linguistics society podcast

Nadia:Right, Josh — episode four. We promised the committee a plan by tonight, so let's pin things down. Are we still doing language change?

Josh:That's what we pitched, but I've been sketching an outline and honestly, it's hopeless. Language change is a whole lecture course — sound shifts, grammar, borrowing, slang... We'd end up skating over everything and saying nothing.

Nadia:I had exactly the same feeling. So what if we take just one thread? Everyone asks me about new words — you know, how something like 'rizz' ends up in the dictionary.

Josh:Yes! That's the episode: how a new word gets into the dictionary. Who decides, what evidence they need, how long it takes. It's concrete, and it's got a story shape.

Nadia:Which brings us to the guest. You suggested Professor Halloran. I emailed him, and to be fair, he replied within the hour and said he'd happily do it.

Josh:But...?

Nadia:But I went and listened to the keynote he gave last term. Josh, honestly — ten minutes on corpus lemmatisation. He's brilliant, but for a general audience it would be completely impenetrable. I don't think we can use him.

Josh:Hmm. I hate turning down someone who's willing... but you're right, the podcast is for freshers and the public, not specialists. So who instead?

Nadia:Kate Munro. She's an editor at a dictionary publisher — she literally sits on the panel that approves new entries, and I've heard her on the radio: she's funny, and she explains with examples.

Josh:Perfect. I'll email her today and offer her a choice of dates. Now — where do we record? I assumed the media suite, same as episode three.

Nadia:Can't — the media suite is reserved for exam recordings all this month. The technician suggested the library: there's a small recording booth on the top floor you can book by the hour.

Josh:A booth? Will three people even fit?

Nadia:It seats four, apparently, and the microphones are already set up. I'll book the booth for the week after next.

Josh:Fine. Now, the opening. I still think we start with a comedy sketch — you and me acting out a caveman inventing a word. It'd be memorable.

Nadia:Memorable, yes, but for the wrong reasons — we're not actors, Josh. What if we open with a real clip instead? I could take the recorder into town on Saturday and ask passers-by what new words they've noticed. Thirty seconds of real voices, then we come in.

Josh:Street interviews... actually, that's better than the sketch, isn't it? Real people, real data. Okay, you've convinced me. You do the vox pops, and I'll write the link that follows them.

Nadia:Deal. Length — the committee said episodes can now run to thirty minutes... no, wait, sorry, I'm thinking of last year's rule. They cut it this term: twenty-five minutes maximum, including credits.

Josh:Twenty-five. Tight, but doable if the interview is fifteen. And editing? The society wants everything uploaded on the Monday.

Nadia:Which means the rough edit has to be finished by Friday, so we've got the weekend for fixes. Your turn to edit — I did the last three.

Josh:Fair enough, I'll edit. One more thing — every episode now needs a transcript on the website, for accessibility. That's new.

Nadia:I'll do the transcript while you edit. Right — that's actually a plan.

Section 4 — A lecture on animal navigation, focusing on sea turtles

Lecturer:Today: what may be the most remarkable navigator of all, the sea turtle. A loggerhead hatched in Florida will swim a circuit of the entire North Atlantic — some fifteen thousand kilometres, over a decade — and then return, as an adult, to breed on the very stretch of coast where she hatched.

Lecturer:How? Turtles carry a magnetic sense. The Earth's field varies predictably from place to place, and experiments show turtles detect two features of it: the field's strength, or intensity, and also its angle — the steepness at which the field lines meet the surface, which scientists call inclination. Together, the two values work rather like latitude and longitude, giving the animal what researchers call a magnetic map.

Lecturer:That map is stamped in early. Returning to breed at one's own birth beach is a behaviour biologists call natal homing, and the leading explanation is that hatchlings imprint on the magnetic signature of their birth beach in their first hours, then seek it out decades later. To be honest about the limits: the receptor has never been found, and the imprinting account is not yet fully proven.

Lecturer:The evidence is striking. In the classic experiments, hatchlings swam in water tanks surrounded by magnetic coils, which reproduce the field of any point on the globe — and they headed in the direction that, at the simulated location, would have kept them inside the warm Atlantic currents. The precision in the wild is astonishing: genetic studies show most adult females nest within a few kilometres of their own hatching site.

Lecturer:Now to correct a popular story, because it matters for conservation. Ask how a hatchling, emerging at night, finds the sea, and most people say it follows the moon. It is wrong: hatchlings tested under moonless, overcast skies find the water perfectly well. What they actually do is crawl towards the brightest horizon. For millions of years that was reliable, because the sea reflects starlight while the dunes stand dark behind the beach.

Lecturer:You can see what breaks that ancient rule: street lighting. On a developed coast the brightest horizon is no longer the sea but the road behind the beach, so instead of scrambling down to the water, hatchlings head inland, towards hotels and car parks. Many are taken by predators, and most of the rest die of exhaustion before dawn. In Florida alone, disorientation is estimated to kill hundreds of thousands of hatchlings a year.

Lecturer:The fix, encouragingly, is cheap and proven. Turtles are far less sensitive to long wavelengths, so towns that replace white lamps with red lights — shielded and mounted low — see disorientation fall dramatically, in some counties by more than three-quarters. No new technology is needed, just planning rules.

Lecturer:A subtler threat brings us back to the magnetic map. A beach's magnetic signature can be altered by human structures, and researchers now worry about the steel used in sea walls and other coastal defences, which measurably distorts the local field. If a returning female cannot recognise her natal beach, she may waste precious weeks searching. I stress the qualifier: so far this is demonstrated mainly in the laboratory. But an animal that reads the world through senses we lack can be harmed by changes we cannot even perceive. Next week: how salmon manage a comparable feat.