CELPIP Listening score chart: levels, CLB, and targets

Your CELPIP Listening result is a level from 0 to 12, and from level 3 upward it equals the same CLB level. A CELPIP Listening 9 is CLB 9. A Listening 5 is CLB 5. The chart below gives every level, what CELPIP says it means, and how it lines up with CLB and CEFR.

One thing to know before you read it. Your level is a converted score, not a percentage and not a count of correct answers. That is why two people can get the same number of questions right on different test days and still see different levels.

#The CELPIP Listening score chart

This is the official chart, as published by CELPIP. It applies to Listening and to the other three skills, because CELPIP uses one scale across the whole test.

Three points are worth holding on to:

• From CELPIP 3 to 12, your CELPIP level and your CLB level are the same number. Nothing to convert.
• CELPIP 2 is the only level that spans two CLB levels, CLB 1 and CLB 2.
• Levels 0, 1, and NA have no CLB equivalent. They mean there was not enough evidence to place you, or that you did not sit that component.

You will also see the letter M on some CELPIP material. It stands for Minimal and it covers the bottom of the raw-score range, below level 3. It appears in the approximate raw-score table further down this page, not in the level chart above.

The level descriptions and the CLB and CEFR columns come from the official CELPIP score comparison chart. Your Official Score Report is a PDF in your CELPIP account, and you can view it there for two years from your test date.

#What CELPIP Listening level do you need?

It depends on the program you are applying to, and Listening sits in a wider range than most people expect: CLB 4 for citizenship, CLB 5 or 7 for the Express Entry programs, and CLB 9 if you want the points that make a profile competitive.

IRCC accepts the CELPIP-General test for Express Entry and treats your CELPIP level as your CLB level, skill by skill. Your results must be less than two years old both when you complete your profile and when you submit your application.

#Federal Skilled Worker Program

You need at least CLB 7 in all four abilities in your first official language, so CELPIP Listening 7. A Listening level below 7 means you do not meet the minimum, whatever your other three levels look like. If you claim a second official language, the minimum there is CLB 5.

#Canadian Experience Class

Your minimum follows the NOC TEER category of your Canadian work experience:

• TEER 0 or 1: CLB 7 in all four abilities, so CELPIP Listening 7
• TEER 2 or 3: CLB 5 in all four abilities, so CELPIP Listening 5

#Federal Skilled Trades Program

This program splits the four skills, and Listening sits on the higher side of the split. The Federal Skilled Trades Program asks for CLB 5 in speaking and listening, and CLB 4 in reading and writing. So a CELPIP Listening 5 meets it, while Reading and Writing can be a level lower.

This is worth checking carefully if someone has told you the trades program needs "CLB 4". That is the reading and writing bar, not the listening one.

#Canadian citizenship

Citizenship is the one program where Listening matters and Reading does not. Applicants aged 18 to 54 must prove CLB 4 in speaking and listening, so CELPIP Listening 4. This is why the test accepted for citizenship is CELPIP-General LS, a shorter sitting of about 1 hour 10 minutes that covers only those two skills.

#Why CLB 9 is the target so many people aim for

Because that is where the skill-transferability points double. In the CRS, the education and foreign-work-experience tables pay a maximum of 25 points if any one of your four first-language abilities sits below CLB 9, and 50 points once all four are CLB 9 or higher.

That is worth reading twice, because it is the reason a single skill matters so much. If your Reading, Writing, and Speaking are all 9 and your Listening is an 8, you are in the 25-point column, not the 50-point one.

Use the Score and CLB immigration calculator to put your four levels in and see where you land.

Requirements change, so confirm the current ones for your own program before you make any decision. The official pages are IRCC language test results, the CRS criteria, and the IRCC citizenship language proof page.

#How is CELPIP Listening scored?

Your answers are marked right or wrong by computer, then converted twice: from a raw count to a scaled score, and from that scaled score to your CELPIP level.

The section is fully computer-delivered. It has six parts and 38 scored questions, and you get 46 to 55 minutes.

Two features of the section shape how it is scored. The audio plays once. It starts on its own, and there is no pause and no replay, so a detail you miss is gone. And you have to read as well as listen, because the answer options appear on screen.

Every answer is scored as either correct or incorrect. A question you leave blank counts as incorrect, and a wrong answer carries no extra penalty. So there is never a reason to leave anything blank.

Then three things happen to that raw count:

This is why you cannot work out your official level at home from a fixed number of correct answers. CELPIP does not report raw scores for exactly this reason: a raw score of 30 does not mean the same thing on every form.

Two more things about the live test are worth knowing:

• Some questions on your test are not scored. Paragon includes new, pre-test questions in every form. They look identical to the scored ones and you are never told which is which, on purpose. Treat every question as if it counts.
• Listening is machine-scored, so there is no rater to appeal to. CELPIP says that asking for a re-evaluation of Listening or Reading is unlikely to change your result, because no human judgement was involved in the first place.

#The approximate Listening raw-score guide

CELPIP publishes an example chart showing roughly how many correct answers out of 38 correspond to each level. It is an example, not a set of fixed boundaries.

The ranges overlap because the raw score needed for a level shifts a little from form to form. Read it as a rough guide to distance, not as a target. It tells you that moving from a 7 to a 9 is worth about five or six more correct answers, which is a useful thing to know when you are planning study time. Only your Official Score Report gives your real level. The chart and the disclaimer are on the CELPIP test results page.

Notice too that the Listening ranges sit a little higher than the Reading ones. A level 9 in Listening takes about 33 to 35 correct out of 38, where Reading takes about 31 to 33. Both sections have 38 scored questions, so if you are aiming at the same level in both, Listening leaves you slightly less room for error.

#Where do learners lose the most Listening points?

In the parts where several people are talking and nobody states the answer outright. We looked at more than 86,000 answered Listening questions on HelloCelpip, anonymised and aggregated, and sorted every one by the part it came from.

Part 6, Listening to Viewpoints, is the clear low point at about 69%, with Part 5, Listening to a Discussion, next at about 75%. Everything earlier in the section sits between 78% and 84%. Together, Parts 5 and 6 hold 14 of the 38 scored questions, so a weak finish costs more than it looks like it should.

The official part names point at why. The early parts are built around a single situation with one or two speakers: a problem being solved, a daily-life conversation, a short news item. Parts 5 and 6 are a discussion and a set of viewpoints, so there are more voices to keep apart and more than one position being argued. They also come last, at the end of a section that runs 46 to 55 minutes.

Sorting the same questions by what they ask for tells the same story from another angle:

Getting the gist is the easy part. Holding on to one exact detail, and reading a speaker's attitude, are close together and clearly harder. That is a useful thing to know before you plan your study time, because "listen more carefully" is not a plan and "practise the parts where speakers disagree" is.

Try a Part 6 Viewpoints question →

#Estimate your Listening level before test day

You can get a good sense of where you stand right now. On HelloCelpip, Listening questions follow the same six parts and the same formats as the real test, the audio plays once just as it does on test day, you get a level after every attempt, and the feedback shows which parts are costing you, so you can choose what to work on next.

A simple way to use this page: answer a few Listening questions to find your weakest part, run a full timed mock when you want to know how you cope with the whole section in one sitting, then come back to the chart above and check the distance to the level your program asks for.

#CELPIP Listening score chart FAQ

For how your level maps across the other skills, see the CELPIP Reading score chart.

Official sources:

• CELPIP test results and scoring
• CELPIP score comparison chart, CLB and CEFR
• CELPIP test format
• IRCC Express Entry language test results
• IRCC Comprehensive Ranking System criteria
• IRCC citizenship language proof

Last updated: July 24, 2026