The Duolingo English Test
What is the Duolingo English Test?
The Duolingo English Test is a computer adaptive test of English language proficiency. Computer adaptive basically means that while you are taking the test a computer is constantly adjusting to what it thinks your level is, making the questions more difficult or easy as it gets a better idea of your proficiency. As you might guess, this test was developed by the company that developed the popular language-learning app, Duolingo.
Some of the benefits of the Duolingo English Test are
you can take it online, from home
it takes only an hour
you get your results in only 2 days
it costs only $49 USD
Preparing for the Duolingo English Test
To take the test, you will need the following:
a laptop or desktop computer
either Google Chrome or Opera as a web browser
a webcam and built-in computer speakers/microphone
a quiet place with a flat surface
What are the question types?
The Duolingo English Test is a little different from other English tests. Some of the questions are strange. There are seven different scored question types and two unscored questions.
Complete the Words - In these questions, you will be given a short text where some words are incomplete. You will need to complete these words with the missing letters.
Identify Real Written Words - In these questions, you will see a list of words. Some are actual English words and some are invented. You need to identify the real English Words.
Identify Real Spoken Words - This task is the same as the previous one—you need to identify the actual English words. But in these ones, you listen to an audio recording of the words instead of reading them on your screen.
Take Dictation - In these questions, you will hear an audio recording and you will have one minute to type what you hear.
Read Aloud - For these tasks, you will see a sentence on your screen, and you have to record yourself saying the sentence aloud.
Extended Speaking - You will be shown different prompts (a picture, a written prompt, an audio recording) and you will need to speak for at least 30 seconds in response.
Extended Writing - These are similar to the extended speaking questions; you will see a prompt, and instead of speaking, you need to write at least 50 words in response.
What is the Duolingo English Test For?
Most notably, the Duolingo English Test is used for admission to English-language universities. When it first came out, Duolingo struggled a bit to break into the university market, but when the COVID-19 crisis forced many countries into lockdown, IELTS and TOEFL became much more difficult to take, and many universities rapidly began to accept Duolingo.
According to Duolingo, over 2,000 institutions accept the test for admission. Some of the more prestigious universities on the list are Columbia, MIT, Yale, Stanford, UPenn, Duke, Cornell, and Brown.
Is Duolingo a good test?
This is tough to know. Most of what has been written about the Duolingo English Test has been published by Duolingo, so it is not independent or peer-reviewed.
The most authoritative independent reviews of the Duolingo English Test are Wagner and Kunnan (2015) and Wagner (2020). Among their most important conclusions were that “the test does not assess test takers’ academic language ability.” This is pretty important for a test being used for university admissions. Because the test is a series of activities completed on your computer, the test doesn’t assess your ability to interact in English. They also note that the Duolingo English Test “is susceptible to cheating and test preparation” (p. 300). Wagner concludes with, “in its current formulation, I cannot recommend that DET scores be used for university admissions purposes” (p. 314). Similarly, on forums for English teachers and program administrators, many have expressed concerns that the test is too easy or that students’ scores are not representative of their actual English proficiency.