How many words for each level
How many English words do you already know? The free test shows your vocabulary size and CEFR level in 3 minutes.
Take the test →| Level | Words | What you can do |
|---|---|---|
| A1 | up to 1,500 | Introduce yourself, order a coffee, ask the way and understand short signs and messages. |
| A2 | 1,500–2,500 | Talk about work, family and shopping, and write a short email to a colleague. |
| B1 | 2,750–3,250 | Travel on your own, follow a clear podcast on a familiar topic and explain your opinion. |
| B2 | 3,250–3,750 | Follow the news and TV series with English subtitles and handle a meeting or a job interview. |
| C1 | 3,750–4,500 | Read reports and articles without a dictionary and work or study in English. |
The ranges come from Milton and Alexiou (2009), who tested how many of the 5,000 most frequent English words learners at each CEFR level recognise. They are estimates of receptive vocabulary: the words you actively use are usually fewer. All levels in one table: how many words you need for A1–C1.
How much of a text the most common words cover
Nation (2006) measured this with word-family lists from the British National Corpus. The 1,000 most frequent families cover about 81% of the words in a novel, 2,000 cover about 88% of a novel and 89% of everyday conversation, and with 3,000 families plus names you know over 95% of the words in unscripted speech. To read a novel or a newspaper with only one unknown word in 50, you need 8,000–9,000 families.
Start with these words
These words are among the most frequent in English corpora such as COCA (Davies and Gardner, 2010). They turn up in almost every sentence, so each one you learn pays off straight away.
- be am, is, are; was, were
- have own; also forms tenses
- do do; forms questions
- say say, tell in words
- get receive, become, arrive
- make make, create, cause
- go go; went, gone
- know know; knew, known
- what which thing
- who which person
- how in what way
- why for what reason
- because gives a reason
- but shows a contrast
- if sets a condition
- so shows a result
- time time; also “three times”
- day 24 hours, daytime
- year 12 months
- week 7 days
- now at this moment
- today this day
- always every time
- never not ever
- people plural of person
- man adult male
- woman adult female
- child plural: children
- friend someone you like
- home where you live
- world the earth, everyone
- place a location
What makes English vocabulary easier or harder
Nation (2006) notes that over 90% of the words in the Academic Word List come from French, Latin or Greek, so speakers of Romance languages recognise much of formal English. Information, situation and important look familiar to an Italian, a Spaniard or a Brazilian.
Words that look familiar can mean something else in English. Actually means “in fact”, not “currently”, and a library is where you borrow books, not a bookshop.
Short verbs combine with small words into new meanings that you can’t guess from the parts. Give up means “stop trying” and look after means “take care of”.
English spelling often doesn’t tell you how to say a word. Though, through and tough end in the same letters but sound different, so learn every new word with audio.
Which topics to learn at each level
- A1. yourself and your family, numbers, days and times, food and drink, the home, shopping. Learn whole phrases like “How much is it?”.
- A2. work and daily routine, travel and transport, health, weather, clothes, free time. Add the past forms of the most common irregular verbs.
- B1. feelings and opinions, education, the media, the environment, money, the most frequent phrasal verbs. Practise saying why you think something.
- B2. work and careers, technology, society, the news, abstract nouns like issue or approach, collocations. Learn words in pairs, like make a decision.
- C1. academic and professional vocabulary, idioms, formal and informal synonyms, the words of your field. Read widely and note the words that keep coming back.
Type a topic or a level into the generation chat in the app, for example “B1: work and career”, and get a word set with examples in context, audio and smart reviews. Any other topic works too.
How long it takes
At 10 new words a day with regular reviews you learn about 300 words a month, or around 3,600 a year: from zero to B1 in roughly a year. At 20 a day it takes about half as long, as long as you keep up with the reviews. Most learners already know some English from school, songs and the internet, so start with a test rather than from word one. You will forget some words along the way, which is why spaced repetition matters more than speed.
How NewLexi helps you build your vocabulary
In NewLexi you generate word sets by level or by topic in the chat, and they arrive already split into categories, for example “A2: travel” or “B2: job interview”. Every word comes in context with audio, and spaced repetition brings it back just before you would forget it. Stories and dialogues are written for you, at your level and with your words, and you can import words by photo or from Anki and Quizlet. Start with the free vocabulary test to see how many English words you already know.
