Cambridge IELTS 14 Reading Test 2
The three passages in this test, the question types you will meet in each, and what to watch for. Practise the full test free, marked instantly, with the answer explained for every question you get wrong.
Passages in this test
| # | Passage title | Length |
|---|---|---|
| Passage 1 | Alexander Henderson (1831‑1913) | 883 words |
| Passage 2 | Back to the future of skyscraper design | 878 words |
| Passage 3 | Why companies should welcome disorder | 790 words |
You have 60 minutes for all 40 questions and no extra transfer time in the Academic Reading paper, so roughly 20 minutes per passage including writing your answers onto the answer sheet.
Question types in this test
This test is weighted towards true / false / not given. The table below shows every type that appears and what each one is actually testing.
| Question type | Questions | What it tests |
|---|---|---|
| True / False / Not Given | 11 | False means the passage contradicts the statement; Not Given means the passage is silent on it. Candidates lose most marks here by using outside knowledge to fill the gap. |
| Sentence and note completion | 8 | Answers appear in passage order, so a found answer narrows the search area for the next one. Check the word limit in the instruction — exceeding it scores zero even when the meaning is right. |
| Summary completion | 8 | Usually drawn from one section of the passage rather than all of it. Read the whole summary first and predict the part of speech each gap needs before you go looking. |
| Matching headings | 8 | Do this type last. Headings describe the main idea of a paragraph, so the answer is rarely in the first sentence — that is where the tempting wrong heading usually matches. |
| Matching information to paragraphs | 5 | The hardest type in Academic Reading for most candidates, because the answers are not in order and any paragraph can be used more than once. Scan for the specific detail, not for the topic of the paragraph. |
How to use this test
Do it once under strict timing, with no dictionary and no pausing — a reading score you got with extra time tells you nothing useful about test day. Mark it, then go back to every question you missed and find the exact line in the passage that decides the answer. That second pass is where the score actually improves; simply doing more tests without it tends to leave candidates on the same band for months.
If you run out of time before finishing, the problem is almost never reading speed. It is usually time spent re-reading a passage for questions whose answers are not in order — true / false / not given being the usual culprit. Leaving those until last is worth more than reading faster.
Common questions
Is this the real Cambridge IELTS 14 reading test?
Yes — this page describes the Academic Reading paper from Cambridge IELTS 14, Test 2, and the practice version is the complete test with all 40 questions. The passages themselves are Cambridge copyright material, so they are inside the practice app rather than reproduced on this page.
What band score is 40 correct answers?
On Academic Reading, roughly 30 correct is Band 7, 35 is Band 8 and 39 is Band 9, though Cambridge adjusts the boundaries slightly per test. The practice app converts your raw score for you.
Are the answers explained?
Yes. Every question shows the correct answer and the specific part of the passage that justifies it, so you can see why the answer you chose was wrong rather than just that it was.