UK Settlement English Test: What B1 Speaking Takes

There is a version of the English exam problem that gets almost no coverage, and it carries the highest stakes of any of them.

Somebody has lived in the UK for five years. They work, pay tax, have a family here. Between them and permanent residence sits a short spoken interview. On one approved B1 test it runs eleven to thirteen minutes. Fail it and the application is refused, the fee is gone, and the right to stay is delayed or broken.

If you want daily practice for that conversation, SpeakShark is free with three AI conversation sessions a day and no card, each capped at five minutes and four turns.

In this guide: what the test is · no reading or writing · providers, split by location · the two formats · the levels gov.uk states · the staircase problem · how to prepare · what we could not verify · how we researched this guide · FAQ

Key takeaways

For settlement and citizenship the UK requires a speaking and listening test, not a four skill one. gov.uk splits SELT requirements into those two buckets.
The approved provider list is split by where you sit the test. Trinity College London appears only under gov.uk's heading for applicants in the UK. PSI Services (UK) Ltd, with Skills for English UKVI, appears only under the heading for applicants outside of the UK. The IELTS SELT Consortium, LanguageCert and Pearson appear under both.
On the family visa page, B1 is framed as a result you can reuse at settlement after 5 years, rather than as the level that page asks for at settlement. The separate gov.uk English language page lists an English qualification at B1, B2, C1 or C2 level for people aged 18 or over applying for citizenship or to settle.
Trinity's GESE is not an exam with a speaking section. Its own pages describe it as speaking and listening with no reading or writing at all.
LanguageCert's B1 Speaking and Listening test is one to one with a real examiner online, running 11 to 13 minutes.
gov.uk publishes both a levels table, dated 8 January 2026, and per route guidance. Read both for your own application date, because requirements change and we found a provider page already stale against gov.uk.

What the UK settlement English test actually is

The formal name is a Secure English Language Test, usually shortened to SELT. It is not a general English qualification you can substitute with any certificate you happen to hold. The Home Office approves specific providers and specific tests, and anything outside that list does not count.

The important structural fact, and the one that changes how you should prepare, is that gov.uk splits the requirement into two buckets.

Speaking and listening only. This bucket covers citizenship, settlement, the partner and parent family routes, International Sportsperson, and Representative of an Overseas Business.

Four skills, meaning reading, writing, speaking and listening. This bucket generally covers work and study routes such as Skilled Worker, Health and Care Worker, Scale up Worker, Innovator Founder, Minister of Religion, Start up, High Potential Individual, Student and Temporary Work International Agreement.

If your route is settlement or citizenship, you are in the first bucket. There is no essay, no comprehension passage, and nothing to revise in the way most exam preparation assumes. Our guide to which English test a UK visa needs covers how the two buckets map across every route.

The part nobody expects: no reading or writing

Candidates coming from an IELTS background find this genuinely disorienting, and it cuts both ways.

It removes the parts many people are strongest at. If your written English carries your scores, it is not available here. Everything rests on a short live conversation.

It also removes the parts that take months to build. There is no academic vocabulary to accumulate and no essay structure to learn. What is left is the thing you either do daily or do not.

Home Office caseworker guidance puts it in plain words for the family routes: an applicant in the partner or parent routes does not need to demonstrate reading and writing skills.

Trinity's GESE is the clearest illustration of what that leaves. Per Trinity's own pages it is a one to one speaking and listening examination with a trained examiner, live and unscripted, with no reading or writing at all. It runs across twelve grades in four stages, from roughly 5 to 25 minutes depending on the grade.

That makes it unusual among the tests we cover. Most exams have a speaking section. This one is the speaking section.

The five approved providers, split by where you sit the test

This is the detail most comparison pages flatten, and flattening it is expensive.

gov.uk's SELT guidance names five providers, but it does not present them as one list. It uses two headings, one for applicants who are in the UK and one for applicants who are outside of the UK, and the two lists are not the same.

Provider	Where gov.uk lists it	Notable for
Trinity College London	In the UK only	GESE, a pure speaking and listening exam, and ISE for four skill routes
PSI Services (UK) Ltd	Outside the UK only	Skills for English UKVI
IELTS SELT Consortium	In the UK and outside the UK	The SELT version of IELTS, distinct from ordinary IELTS
LanguageCert	In the UK and outside the UK	Two skill SELTs at A1, A2 and B1, plus General and Academic SELTs
Pearson	In the UK and outside the UK	PTE Academic UKVI and PTE Home

So the order of questions is location first, then level, then everything else. Work out which of gov.uk's two lists applies to you before you compare formats, centres or prices. Only then is it true that any approved test at the right level satisfies the requirement, because the approved set is not the same at the two locations.

That ordering matters more on the family routes than people expect. A first family visa application is normally made from outside the UK, while an extension is normally made from inside it, so the same person can face two different provider lists at two stages of one route. If you are applying from abroad, Trinity is not on your list, whatever a comparison page told you. If you are applying from inside the UK, Skills for English UKVI from PSI Services is not on yours.

Two further cautions before you book with anybody.

An ordinary test is not a SELT. IELTS for UKVI is not the same booking as ordinary IELTS, and a certificate from the wrong version is money spent for nothing. Our guide to IELTS UKVI, Academic and General covers that distinction.

Availability and format still differ inside your list. Approved centres vary by country and city, so once you know which list applies, check where you can actually sit the test before weighing format or price.

The two formats you will actually meet

For the speaking and listening routes, the two formats most applicants encounter look like this. Read the location row first, because it decides whether both are even open to you.

	Trinity GESE	LanguageCert B1 Speaking and Listening
Where gov.uk lists it	Tests taken in the UK	Tests taken in the UK and outside the UK
What it is	Speaking and listening examination, no reading or writing	Two skill SELT, speaking and listening
Examiner	A trained Trinity examiner, one to one	A real person online, one to one
Length	5 to 25 minutes depending on grade	11 to 13 minutes
Shape	Unscripted conversation, plus a topic you prepare at some grades	Five parts, including personal questions, a role play, and describing images
Marked by	A human examiner	A human examiner

Three things follow from that table.

If you are applying from outside the UK, the first column is not your option. Trinity sits under gov.uk's in the UK heading only. This is not a comment on the exam, which is a good fit for these routes. It is a comment on where gov.uk will accept it from.

A person is in the room, or on the call. LanguageCert states plainly that its speaking exams are carried out by a real person online. This is the opposite of CELPIP, where you record into a microphone with nobody reacting. If you have prepared for a recorded test, the social pressure here is a different skill. Our CELPIP versus IELTS comparison covers why that difference matters more than most people expect.

There is a role play. LanguageCert's B1 description includes starting a conversation and responding appropriately in everyday situations. That is a discrete skill, and it is the one candidates practise least. Role play scenarios and English job interview role plays are the closest rehearsal format.

The levels gov.uk states, and why you still check the date

An earlier version of this guide refused to publish any level at all. That was the wrong call, and correcting it is worth doing in the open, because the reason it was wrong is also the reason you should still check gov.uk yourself.

gov.uk publishes both a levels table and per route guidance. The table, "English language requirement levels for immigration applications", is dated 8 January 2026 and gives the family visa as A1 if this is your first application and A2 if you are applying to extend your stay. The per route pages carry the detail a table cannot hold, such as what happens if you were exempt the first time round. Read both for your own application.

Here is what gov.uk states, stage by stage.

First family visa application: at least A1. gov.uk adds that you can choose to take a higher level test, which is the single most useful sentence in the whole requirement. The UK spouse visa English requirement covers that stage in full.

Extension after two and a half years: at least A2 in speaking and listening, if you passed A1 the first time. If you passed A2, B1, B2, C1 or C2, gov.uk says you can use that result again, provided the certificate has not been withdrawn by the test provider. If you were given an exemption first time round, gov.uk says you will need to pass a test at level A1. The A2 extension guide works through all three situations.

Settlement: read the wording carefully, because the family page states a permission rather than a demand. gov.uk's family visa page says that if you pass level B1 or higher, you can use your test result again when you apply for settlement after 5 years. That is permission to reuse a result you already hold. It is not that page telling you what settlement requires. The requirement itself is framed on the separate gov.uk English language page, which lists an English qualification at B1, B2, C1 or C2 level around being 18 or over and applying for citizenship or to settle in the UK.

That distinction is not pedantry. A reader who sees only the family page can walk away thinking B1 is a fresh test they must sit at year five. A reader who sees only the English language page can miss that a B1 pass taken years earlier may already be usable. The two pages answer different questions and you need both.

And requirements change. When we checked in August 2026, at least one approved provider's own visa requirements page listed a level for a work route that gov.uk had already changed. The provider is not being dishonest, since provider pages simply lag policy. But it means the safest looking source, the company selling you the test, was the wrong one to trust.

The rule that follows is simple. Read the level requirement on gov.uk for your specific route and your specific application date, then book an approved test that satisfies it and is available where you will be sitting it. If a provider page and gov.uk disagree, gov.uk is the one that decides your application.

The staircase most family route applicants miss

If you are on a family route, this is worth knowing years before it becomes urgent.

The family routes involve tests at more than one point rather than a single test at the end. A1 at the first application, A2 at the extension if A1 is what you passed, and then the settlement stage with its own page and its own wording. Trinity also lists GESE grades against several UK routes, which is another way the same staircase shows up.

The practical consequence is that you will sit a speaking test more than once, years apart, unless you use the reuse rule deliberately. gov.uk lets you take a higher level test than the minimum, and a result at A2 or above can carry to the extension, and at B1 or above can carry to settlement, provided the certificate has not been withdrawn. One test at the right level can replace two later ones.

People who treat the first test as a hurdle to clear and then stop speaking English deliberately find the later, harder one much worse than it needed to be. The much cheaper strategy is to keep a small daily speaking habit running between tests rather than cramming before each. A 30 day plan to improve speaking and free methods to raise fluency cover what that looks like.

Which level applies at which stage of your route, and which providers are open to you at each stage, are both worth confirming on gov.uk at the time you apply rather than trusting a guide written earlier.

How to prepare for a speaking only test

Stop studying and start talking. There is no reading or writing component, so revision converts badly. Fifteen to twenty minutes of unscripted speech a day beats a weekend with a book.
Rehearse the functions, not answers. Answering questions about yourself, starting a conversation, describing a picture, responding to what somebody just said. Those are the published shapes. Daily use English sentences and English conversation topics for adults give you material.
Practise with a person reacting. These tests use a live examiner, so silent recording apps train the wrong condition. If you have nobody, an AI that answers back is closer than a recorder. How to practise English speaking alone covers the options.
Drill the role play specifically. Starting a conversation from nothing is harder than answering, and it is the part most people never rehearse.
Fix clarity, not accent. Being understood the first time is the bar. Six pronunciation fixes in fourteen days and reducing mother tongue influence target that.
Work on the nerves separately. For many applicants the English is adequate and the pressure is not. Overcoming the fear of speaking English and building confidence in English address it directly, and you can start a free session to get low stakes reps in.

Not sure where you stand? Test your English speaking level free first, and if you have been studying for years without the speaking improving, why your English speaking is not improving is the more useful read.

What we could not verify

We are not publishing test fees. Only third party consultancy figures were visible, not a provider fee schedule we could confirm.

We are not publishing booking lead times. They vary by country and by centre, and a figure that is right in one city is wrong in another.

We are not reproducing the exemption list. gov.uk publishes it, the wording varies between the documents we read, and an exemption you assume you have and do not is one of the more expensive mistakes available in this process.

We are not publishing candidate numbers. Neither Trinity nor LanguageCert publishes a SELT candidate count. Trinity's widely quoted figure of over 700,000 candidates a year covers all Trinity qualifications including music and drama, so it must never be presented as an English exam figure.

We are not ranking these tests by difficulty. No exam body publishes comparative difficulty, and the rankings that circulate come from companies selling preparation.

We have not confirmed exact delivery arrangements. Trinity's product pages and its SELT FAQ describe delivery differently in places, so confirm how and where your test runs when you book.

We have not reproduced any test content.

Every level and every provider list in this guide is quoted from gov.uk as it stood when we checked. Immigration requirements change, sometimes with a future start date attached. Read gov.uk for your own route, your own location and your own application date.

How we researched this guide

The two bucket split between speaking and listening routes and four skill routes comes from gov.uk's SELT guidance, as does the approved provider list. That same guidance is where the location split comes from: it lists providers under separate headings for applicants who are in the UK and applicants who are outside of the UK, which is why Trinity appears in one list and PSI Services in the other.

The route to level table, dated 8 January 2026, comes from gov.uk's published English language requirement levels document. The A1 first application level, the A2 extension rule, the reuse wording and the exemption edge case come from gov.uk's family visa knowledge of English page, which is also where the B1 reuse permission is worded. The B1 to C2 framing for people aged 18 or over applying for citizenship or to settle comes from gov.uk's English language page. The statement that partner and parent applicants do not need reading and writing comes from Home Office caseworker guidance.

The GESE format, its grade structure and the absence of reading and writing come from Trinity College London's own qualification pages. The LanguageCert B1 Speaking and Listening format, its length and the statement that speaking exams are carried out by a real person online come from LanguageCert's own SELT pages.

The observation that a provider page had fallen behind gov.uk is our own check in August 2026, and we have described it without naming the level, because the level is exactly the thing readers should take from gov.uk at their own application date rather than from us.

Where a figure would have made this guide more concrete but could not be traced to gov.uk or to the provider, we left it out and said so above.

Practise speaking, from SpeakShark

SpeakShark is an AI English speaking practice app, and it is our pick for a speaking only test for the obvious reason: there is nothing else to revise. The whole result rests on a short live conversation, and the only preparation that moves that is producing a lot of unscripted speech. You talk, the AI answers what you actually said, and you get speaking feedback while the conversation is still going. The free tier gives basic feedback; the detailed pronunciation and grammar breakdown is on Premium.

Start free with three sessions a day and no card, each free session capped at five minutes and four turns. Paid sessions run ten minutes with unlimited turns. Limits are on the pricing page, and how it works walks through a full session.

We are a speaking improvement tool. We are not an exam preparation provider, not an immigration adviser, and not affiliated with Trinity College London, LanguageCert, Pearson, PSI Services, the IELTS SELT Consortium, the Home Office or any exam board. For test format, booking and official practice material, go to the exam body directly, and for the English level your visa route requires, read gov.uk. Use SpeakShark to make your spoken English stronger, and use official material to learn the test.

Site: speakshark.com
Support: speaksharksupport@gmail.com
Free tier: 3 AI conversation sessions per day, no card

Sources

gov.uk, prove your English language abilities with a SELT: the approved providers listed separately for applicants in the UK and outside of the UK, and the split between speaking and listening routes and four skill routes
gov.uk, English language requirement levels for immigration applications: the route to level table dated 8 January 2026
gov.uk, family visa knowledge of English: the A1 first application level, the A2 extension rule, the exemption edge case and the B1 reuse permission
gov.uk, English language: the B1, B2, C1 or C2 qualification levels for people aged 18 or over applying for citizenship or to settle
Home Office, English language requirement for family members: partner and parent applicants do not need to demonstrate reading and writing
Trinity College London, GESE: a speaking and listening examination with no reading or writing, twelve grades, one to one with an examiner
Trinity College London, SELT: which Trinity qualifications are approved for UK visa routes
LanguageCert SELT: the two skill Speaking and Listening SELTs
LanguageCert B1 Speaking and Listening: one to one computer based test with an examiner, 11 to 13 minutes, five parts
LanguageCert UK visa exams: speaking exams are carried out by a real person online

FAQ

Which English test do I need for UK settlement or citizenship?

A Secure English Language Test from a Home Office approved provider, and for these routes it is a speaking and listening test rather than a four skill one. Check where you will be sitting the test before anything else, because gov.uk splits its approved list in two. Under the heading for applicants in the UK it names Trinity College London, the IELTS SELT Consortium, LanguageCert and Pearson. Under the heading for applicants outside of the UK it names PSI Services (UK) Ltd, the IELTS SELT Consortium, LanguageCert and Pearson. So Trinity is only an option for a test taken in the UK, and Skills for English UKVI from PSI Services only for a test taken outside it.

What level does gov.uk state for settlement after five years?

Read two gov.uk pages, because they put it in different ways. The family visa page frames B1 as a reuse permission: if you pass level B1 or higher, you can use your test result again when you apply for settlement after 5 years. That is permission to reuse a result rather than a statement of what settlement itself asks for. The separate gov.uk English language page lists an English qualification at B1, B2, C1 or C2 level, and frames that around being 18 or over and applying for citizenship or to settle in the UK. Requirements change, so confirm both pages at your own application date.

Is there really no reading or writing in the settlement test?

Not for the speaking and listening routes. gov.uk splits SELT requirements into two buckets, and citizenship, settlement, partner, parent, International Sportsperson and Representative of an Overseas Business sit in the speaking and listening bucket. Home Office caseworker guidance says it plainly for the family routes: an applicant in the partner or parent routes does not need to demonstrate reading and writing skills. Trinity's GESE is the clearest example of the format, since its own pages describe it as a speaking and listening examination with no reading or writing at all. Work and study routes generally sit in the four skill bucket instead.

How long is the B1 speaking test, and is it marked by a computer?

It is short, which is what surprises people, and a person is running it. LanguageCert describes its B1 Speaking and Listening test as a one to one computer based test with an examiner running 11 to 13 minutes, and states plainly that its speaking exams are carried out by a real person online. Trinity's GESE, which gov.uk lists for tests taken in the UK, is a one to one examination with a trained Trinity examiner running from 5 to 25 minutes depending on the grade. Either way you are assessed on a single short conversation with somebody who reacts to you.

Can I trust the level listed on the test provider's website?

Check gov.uk instead, and this is not a theoretical caution. When we checked in August 2026, at least one approved provider's own visa requirements page listed a level for a work route that gov.uk had already changed. Providers sell the test; the Home Office sets the requirement. If the two disagree, the Home Office is the one that decides your application. gov.uk publishes both a levels table and per route guidance, so read the pages that cover your own route at your own application date.

How do I practise for a test that is only speaking?

By speaking, daily, out loud, unscripted. There is no reading or writing to revise, so study time converts badly and talking time converts well. Rehearse the specific functions these tests use, which are answering personal questions, starting and sustaining a conversation, describing images and responding to what somebody just said, rather than memorising answers. A live examiner reacts to you, so practising with something that answers back is closer to the real condition than recording yourself in silence.