How the test works
The test follows the well-known Yes/No format (Meara and Buxton, 1987; X_Lex by Meara and Milton, 2003). The 50 real words come from five frequency bands of a English frequency list built from film and TV subtitles (OpenSubtitles): 10 words from the 1,000 most common words, 10 from the second thousand, and so on up to 5,000. The share of words you know in each band is multiplied by 1,000, and the five results are added up.
The 15 made-up words check for guessing: if you tick some of them, the score in each band is lowered by the same proportion. The result is an estimate, not an exam: a short test gives an error of a few hundred words.
Vocabulary size and CEFR levels
| Level | Words |
|---|---|
| A1 | up to 1,500 |
| A2 | 1,500–2,500 |
| B1 | 2,750–3,250 |
| B2 | 3,250–3,750 |
| C1 | 3,750–4,500 |
| C2 | 4,500–5,000 |
The scale comes from research on learners of English and French; for other languages it is an approximate guide.
How to grow your vocabulary
Learn the most frequent words first and review them with spaced repetition, so each word comes back just before you would forget it. Then meet the words in texts at your level: that is how they move into your active vocabulary. More: how many words you need for A1–B2 and spaced repetition and SM-2.
FAQ
How accurate is the test?
It gives an estimate within a few hundred words. For a more precise result, take it again a few days later and look at the average.
Why are there made-up words?
They show how much you guess. If you tick made-up words, the score is lowered so that it reflects the words you really know.
Why does the test stop at 5,000 words?
The research that links vocabulary size to CEFR levels uses the 5,000 most common words. Knowing almost all of them matches level C2.
Sources
- Lison, P., & Tiedemann, J. (2016). OpenSubtitles2016: Extracting large parallel corpora from movie and TV subtitles. LREC 2016. Frequency lists: FrequencyWords (H. Dave). github.com/hermitdave/FrequencyWords
- Meara, P., & Milton, J. (2003). X_Lex: The Swansea Levels Test. Express Publishing. www.lognostics.co.uk/tools
- Meara, P., & Buxton, B. (1987). An alternative to multiple choice vocabulary tests. Language Testing, 4(2), 142–154. doi.org/10.1177/026553228700400202
- Milton, J., & Alexiou, T. (2009). Vocabulary size and the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages. Palgrave Macmillan. doi.org/10.1057/9780230242258_12
