English C2 practice test

10 free English practice questions at C2 — proficient, with answers. 96 questions in the full bank, covering 4 topics.

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4

10 free practice questions

Pick an answer to check it. No account needed. Every question explains why the answer is right.

1. Question 1grammar

   So slender were the margins ___ a recount was inevitable.

   • Awhich
   • Band
   • Cthat
   • Dso
   Show explanation

   Answer: C

   The inverted "so + adjective + be" pattern is completed by "that" introducing the consequence.

2. Question 2reading

   Conservation areas were introduced to prevent the demolition of coherent streetscapes, and they have done so. What was not anticipated is that the same designation would come to govern window frames, paint colour and the depth of a porch, on the reasoning that if the ensemble matters then so does every part of it. The reasoning is sound. The result is a régime whose defenders and detractors are arguing about different things. What does the writer conclude?

   • AThe designation should be abolished.
   • BA sound principle has produced a régime nobody quite intended.
   • CWindow frames are more important than streetscapes.
   • DConservation areas have failed in their purpose.
   Show explanation

   Answer: B

   The writer grants both that the areas worked and that the reasoning is sound, and locates the problem in an unintended extension.

3. Question 3vocabulary

   The terrace has been restored with scrupulous ___ to the original.

   • Afiduciary
   • Bfidelity
   • Cfideism
   • Dfidelities
   Show explanation

   Answer: B

   Fidelity to something means faithfulness to it. "Fiduciary" concerns trusteeship and "fideism" is a theological term.

4. Question 4writing

   Which sentence carries the concession without surrendering the argument?

   • AThe scheme was expensive, so it should not have proceeded.
   • BThe scheme was expensive and entirely worthwhile.
   • CThe scheme was expensive; the alternative would have cost more.
   • DThe scheme was not expensive at all.
   Show explanation

   Answer: C

   It grants the cost and answers it. The first concedes and capitulates, the second asserts both without connecting them, and the last denies the premise.

5. Question 5grammar

   Not for a moment ___ that the decision would be reversed.

   • Adid we imagine
   • Bwe imagined
   • Cwe did imagine
   • Dhad we imagine
   Show explanation

   Answer: A

   A fronted negative phrase forces inversion of subject and auxiliary.

6. Question 6reading

   That a pursuit is solitary is often treated as evidence that it is anti-social, and the two are not related. The long-distance walker, the amateur astronomer and the restorer of clocks are each participating in something with a literature, a vocabulary and a set of disputes — which is most of what is meant by a community, minus the requirement to be in a room with anybody. What does the writer argue?

   • ASolitary pursuits are healthier than group ones.
   • BCommunities require physical proximity.
   • CSolitary pursuits are genuinely anti-social.
   • DA pursuit can be solitary and still communal.
   Show explanation

   Answer: D

   The passage redefines community as a shared literature, vocabulary and set of disputes — everything but being in a room together.

7. Question 7vocabulary

   The guidebook’s prose is ___ to the point of parody.

   • Apurpler
   • Bpurplish
   • Cpurple
   • Dpurpled
   Show explanation

   Answer: C

   "Purple prose" is the fixed critical term for overwrought writing, and the adjective takes no comparative here.

8. Question 8writing

   Which sentence matches its precision to its evidence?

   • APrecisely 71.4% of visitors return.
   • BAlmost everybody returns.
   • CRoughly seven in ten of those surveyed said they would return.
   • DNearly three-quarters of all visitors return every year.
   Show explanation

   Answer: C

   It rounds appropriately and says who was asked. The two figures imply an accuracy no survey supports, and "almost everybody" abandons the measure.

9. Question 9grammar

   ___ the funding be released immediately was the committee’s one demand.

   • AIt
   • BThat
   • CWhat
   • DWhich
   Show explanation

   Answer: B

   A "that"-clause can serve as the subject of a sentence, and the subjunctive "be released" follows a demand.

10. Question 10reading

    The case against long-haul flight is usually put in terms of the individual traveller, which is where it is weakest — one fewer passenger does not ground an aircraft, and the arithmetic of personal abstention is discouraging. Put in terms of the number of routes an airline can sustain, and of who decides that, it becomes considerably harder to answer. The argument has been lost on the ground it was chosen to fight on. What is the writer’s view of how the argument is usually made?

    • AIt is essentially correct as stated.
    • BIt overstates the environmental harm.
    • CIt is framed in the terms least favourable to it.
    • DIt should not be made at all.
    Show explanation

    Answer: C

    "Lost on the ground it was chosen to fight on" — the writer thinks the case is strong but framed badly, at the level of the individual rather than the route network.