Certificate of Proficiency in English (CPE)
Welcome to the CPE Home page, where you can find all the information and help you need to start preparing for CPE.
ABOUT CPE
CPE is the highest-level Cambridge ESOL exam, at Level C2 of the Council of Europe's Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR). What is Level C2?
What's in CPE?
The table below shows you the different parts of CPE. You can also view the CPE papers in more detail.
| Paper | Content | Time | Marks (% of total) |
|---|---|---|---|
 Reading |
4 parts/40 questions | 1 hour 30 minutes | 20% |
 Writing |
2 parts | 2 hours | 20% |
 Use of English |
5 parts/44 questions | 1 hour 30 minutes | 20% |
 Listening |
4 parts/28 questions | about 40 minutes | 20% |
 Speaking |
3 parts | 19 minutes per pair of candidates | 20% |
SUPPORT FOR CPE
To help you get started, Cambridge ESOL have some FREE material which you can download for CPE.
Information for Candidates
This short booklet explains what's in the exam in more detail.
Download the CPE Information for Candidates (English)
(2.3 Mb)
Sample Papers
Download the CPE Reading sample paper (3.2 Mb)
Download the CPE Writing sample paper (764 Kb)
Download the CPE Use of English sample paper (2.4 Mb)
Download the CPE Listening sample paper (1.2 Mb)
Download the CPE Listening mp3 files 
(22 Mb)
Download the CPE Speaking sample test (1.3 Mb)
