IELTS preparation: what the simulator offers, and how to start

One question comes up at the office every single day: TCF or IELTS. The answer fits in a sentence. IELTS is taken in English, the TCF Canada is taken in French, and Express Entry accepts both, because Canada has two official languages.

What changes is you. If English is your stronger language, take IELTS. If French is, take the TCF Canada or the TEF Canada. And if you hold both, the second language adds points to your score, which is often worth the effort.

The site's IELTS preparation is here: /en/prepa-tcf.html#ielts

General Training or Academic: the expensive choice

This is the costliest mistake, and it is made before any revision starts. Both versions share the same name, cost the same and are booked in the same place.

General Training is the version Canadian economic immigration asks for: Express Entry, Provincial Nominee Programs, permanent residence. Its Reading covers adverts, regulations and memos. Its Writing asks for a letter, then an essay.

Academic is the version for universities and some professional bodies. Its Reading reads like a scientific journal, and its Writing starts with describing a graph.

Listening and Speaking are identical in both. Unsure? Write to us before you pay your exam booking. It is a two-minute conversation, and it saves you sitting the test twice.

What the simulator holds

IELTS is now taken on computer in most centres. The simulator reproduces that interface: timer, question number palette, split screen.

Thirty full tests, with 3,600 questions marked and explained in French. A bank of 200 subjects taken out of the tests sits alongside them: essays, letters and cue cards.

Listening runs 30 minutes: four recordings, forty questions, each recording played once only. The accents change from one test to the next, and that is what catches people out on the day.

Reading runs 60 minutes and forty questions, with no extra time to transfer your answers. The texts differ depending on the version you chose.

Writing runs 60 minutes and two tasks. Scripts are marked against the four official criteria: a band per task, your errors quoted and corrected, and what to change in the next script. The bank holds 140 Writing subjects.

Speaking follows the three parts of the interview, with the questions read aloud, one timed minute of preparation and a recording of your answer. There are 110 cards, each with its Part 1 and Part 3 questions.

After each paper the simulator shows your IELTS band and its NCLC equivalent. It is the NCLC that feeds your score, not the band.

Getting started: two free tests

You create a free account and your first two tests open immediately, all four papers included, with their explained corrections. Those two tests open in both versions, so you can try each one before choosing.

The practice area works in English, like the exam itself. That is deliberate, and it is already part of the preparation.

Access, and what the machine does not mark

Every access opens the thirty tests and the bank of 200 subjects. Only the length and the number of AI-marked Writing scripts change. Two weeks, 7,000 FCFA and 3 scripts. One month, 10,000 FCFA and 8 scripts. Two months, 17,000 FCFA and 15 scripts. Three months, 24,000 FCFA and 22 scripts.

An access covers one version, chosen at activation, and opens on two devices at most. If you picked the wrong version, we switch your access at no charge.

Speaking is not marked by a machine, and we say so rather than selling you the opposite: accent, hesitation and fluency need a human ear. You sit the paper in the simulator, you record yourself, and Speaking feedback is arranged with us, session by session. Raise it with the office before you buy your access.

There is only one place to pay: the page itself, on immigration-voyages.com. Never pay a number passed to you in a group or by a third party. Our services are set out on /en/services.html