Pearson announced on 10 July 2025 that PTE Academic would change from 7 August 2025. Two new speaking tasks were added, and the way some answers are scored changed. The changes apply to PTE Academic and PTE Academic UKVI; PTE Core and PTE Home are not affected.
Key facts
- Announced 10 July 2025
- From 7 August 2025
- New tasks Respond to a Situation; Summarize a Group Discussion
- Tests PTE Academic and PTE Academic UKVI (not PTE Core or PTE Home)
- Length Still about two hours
The new tasks
The two new tasks are Respond to a Situation and Summarize a Group Discussion. Pearson says they are designed to test how people communicate in real-life settings. The 20 existing question types keep their format, timing and expected answers, so the test now has 22 task types. Pearson says the average test still takes about two hours, although two questions were added and some existing tasks appear more often.
Scoring
AI still scores every response first. For seven task types, human raters now also mark the content: Describe Image, Retell Lecture, Summarize Written Text, Write Essay, Summarize Spoken Text, Summarize Group Discussion and Respond to a Situation. Where the AI and the human disagree, a second human decides. Pronunciation and oral fluency stay AI-only. Pearson says the aim includes catching copied or memorised answers. The score report still shows an overall score and four skill scores on the 10 to 90 scale.
What stays the same
Pearson says prices, ID rules, booking, retake rules and the usual two-day results did not change with this update.
What this means
If you prepared using older materials, add practice for the two new tasks and stop relying on memorised templates for the content-scored tasks, since human raters now check what you say and write. Use Pearson’s official practice tests that include the new tasks, and check whether the university or visa authority you are applying to has updated its score requirement.