17 Useful PTE Reading Tips, Tricks & Strategies for Beginners

PTE reading tips are used to achieve outstanding results in the PTE reading section. Students must know how to skim/scan a passage, analyze texts, use appropriate collocations, etc. Whether a beginner or an advanced learner, these skills are crucial for the 2025 PTE reading exam. To learn such skills and score high, up to 90, practise our PTE reading tips with the best tricks and strategies. 

Pearson Test of English - Academic (PTE-A) is a standardized test that measures your reading, writing and speaking proficiency in English. To study abroad, non-native English speakers take this PTE Academic test and prove their language proficiency. To ace the PTE reading test on your first attempt, learn the useful tricks like fluency in reading, focus and understanding.  

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Table of Contents

17 Useful PTE Reading Tips

1. Multiple-Choice, Choose Single Answer
2. Multiple-Choice, Choose Multiple Answers
3. Re-order Paragraphs
4. Fill in the Blanks
5. Understand the Question
6. Scanning and Skimming
7. Highlight the Keywords
8. Analyse the Text
9. Use the Elimination Method
10. Improve Time Management
11. Double-check your Answers
12. Use The Correct Collocation
13. Prepare a Dictionary
14. Read What You Like
15. Seek Help from Family and Friends
16. Improve your Grammar
17. Practice Tests

PTE Reading Test Format

FAQs

Top 17 PTE Reading Tips

Below are the top 17 PTE reading tips that guides you how to answer each question type and face the test with confidence. Without further delay, let's jump in. 

1. Multiple-Choice, Choose Single Answer

• Read the question before reading the text to know what kind of information you’re looking for.
• Read the entire passage, understand the main message and locate keywords for correct answers.
• Identify the frequency words (for instance - sometimes, all, often, never, only, always, many, more, occasionally, regularly) and avoid them while answering the question.
• Learn similar words, different words and synonyms for those words you find hard to remember.
• Since there is no negative marking system, answer all questions in the multiple-choice, choose single answer and don’t leave any question blank.
• Use the rule of elimination to narrow down your options swiftly.
• Remember that 65% of the answers lie in the first or last two lines of the passage.
• Since questions are not given in the chronological order as the information in the passage, you must find answers from anywhere in the passage.
• Paraphrase the sentences using different words but without changing the meaning.

2. Multiple-Choice, Choose Multiple Answers

• In multiple-choice: choose multiple answers, you need more time than the MCQ: choose single answer question type.
• Read the stem and options twice to find the text that contains information.
• Note repeated words (if any). 
• Since the "multiple-choice: choose multiple answers" has negative markings, do not choose an incorrect choice. Instead, leave it blank to avoid losing points.

3. Re-order Paragraphs

• In re-order paragraphs, search for a headline and an idea.
• Arrange the sentences in a logical sequence, as there is one mark given for each correct pair.
• Pronouns like he, she, they, them, those, I, we and us are not in the first sentences.
• Check out the contradictory phrases and words such as however, but, although. And, use additional phrases like also, moreover, furthermore, besides, on top of that, etc.

4. Fill in the Blanks

• Fill in the blanks question type does not have negative marking, so answer all questions.
• To fill in the missing words, focus on the parts of speech before and after the text.
• Missing words will always have a synonym in the text.
• One of the important PTE reading fill up tips is vocabulary building.

Now, let’s look into the other important PTE reading tips.

5. Understand the Question

The first important tip in PTE Reading is to understand the question. If you read a question twice and locate keywords, you can easily understand the question and answer based on the question type.

6. Scanning and Skimming

To read fast, you must do scanning and skimming. It not only improves your reading speed but also your attention to details. You can skim and scan through the text to get the main idea of the passage, and locate the answers correctly. This tip is helpful for the fill in the blanks question type.

7. Highlight the Keywords

In the PTE reading passage, pay attention to “clue” words like names, locations, facts and figures, and note them down. These are keywords you need to highlight and use them while answering. For multiple-choice questions, this reading tip is the best as it covers all important vocabulary and phrases.

8. Analyse the Text

After going through the passage once, read the passage in detail to analyse the text. It gives a precise meaning and helps you to identify the answer. If you’re strong in grammar and collocations, you can analyse the text easily. This technique is useful for both short articles and long-form paragraphs.

9. Use the Elimination Method

For MCQs (multiple-choice questions), use the elimination method. This strategy is effective because it eliminates the irrelevant possibilities and gives you the correct answer. This elimination technique is effective for both ‘single answer’ and ‘multiple answers’ questions.

10. Improve Time Management

In the PTE exam pattern, the reading test format alone is 30 minutes long and contains five question types. If you use your time wisely, your time management skills improve. So spend no more than 2 minutes per question. While practising, aim to read at least 220 words per minute. Once you’re happy with comprehension and reading speed, focus on chunks (group of words) instead of individual words.

11. Double-check Your Answers

After completing the test ahead of time, always double-check your answers. It will reduce 60% of common errors such as spelling and grammatical errors, choosing wrong answers, etc. It is one of the important PTE exam reading tips that need to be followed.

12. Use The Correct Collocation

While practising every day, make sure you use the correct collocation. Collocation is a combination of words in a sentence, often linked together. For the fill in the blanks question type, identify answers with common collocations used for a specific word or phrase.

13. Prepare A Dictionary

Preparing a personalised dictionary is an important PTE reading strategy for first-time test takers. You can create a dictionary by marking new words from newspapers, magazines, or any other article. Even if the words are unfamiliar, note them on a separate paper with their meanings for future reference.

14. Read What You Like

To improve your English skills, read what you like. It can be books, blogs, research summaries, news, or even online PTE resources. Since reading is a monotonous activity, you can choose different genres or themes to retain your interest.

15. Seek Help from Family and Friends

Generally, self-learners seek help from their family and friends during their PTE preparation. Getting help from family and friends is a basic PTE reading trick to learn effortlessly. It gives a suitable environment for speed reading and identifying mistakes.

16. Improve your Grammar

Grammar is the foundation of any language, and it’s crucial to have a strong command of it for the PTE reading test. Hence, one of the best PTE reading grammar tips is focusing on tenses and the different parts of speech, like nouns, verbs, pronouns, adjectives and adverbs. To delve deeper, develop your lexical resources, understand the subject-verb agreement, singular/plural, idioms, and propositions.

17. Practice Tests

Practice tests are the change-makers. By practising more samples and mock tests online, you are likely to achieve your targeted score. Pearson’s PTE practice test is a good study material for students to practise and develop their reading skills. It also contains guidelines for effective PTE reading section strategies.

PTE Reading Test Format

PTE Reading test evaluates your ability to read and comprehend academic English through five different question types. You will get 30 minutes (half-an-hour) time to finish the test. Below is the PTE Reading test format:

Question Type	Task	Skills Assessed	No. of Questions	Length	Scoring
Reading and Writing: Fill in the blanks	You will receive a paragraph with blank spaces to fill. You must pick the correct answer from the list of options given in the drop-down button.	Reading and Writing	5 - 6 questions	Text up to 300 words or up to 2000 characters	Partial credit scoring
Multiple-choice, choose multiple answers	Choose one or more answers that you think are correct.	Reading	1 - 2 questions	Text up to 300 words or up to 2000 characters	Partial credit scoring
Reorder paragraphs	Drag the text from the left-hand side to the right-hand side in the appropriate order.	Reading	2 - 3 questions	Text up to 150 words or up to 1000 characters	Partial credit scoring
Reading: Fill in the blanks	Fill the right words from the given options. You will get more options than gaps.	Reading	4 - 5 questions	Text up to 80 words or up to 800 characters	Partial credit scoring
Multiple choice, single answer	You will choose one correct answer from the available options.	Reading	1 - 2 questions	Text up to 300 words or up to 2000 characters	Negative marketing system. So no score for wrong or no response

 

Also Read:

• PTE Accepted Countries
• PTE Exam Fee
• PTE vs IELTS

FAQs

1. How do I get a 90 in reading PTE?

As per the PTE Score Chart, 90 is the maximum score. To get a 90 score in the PTE reading section, you must scan and skim the reading text, identify keywords, understand the main idea, and demonstrate your grammar and vocabulary skills.

2. How to score 65 in PTE reading?

Practise the reading section every day. PTE aspirants must try to read short articles of around 300 words in short periods of time. Use the elimination method. Give right collocations and cohesive devices. These are the simple PTE reading tips and strategies to score 65 in this section.

3. Which is the toughest section in PTE?

The PTE exam consists of three sections:

• Speaking and writing
• Reading
• Listening

Among the above, reading is considered the toughest section for test-takers.

4. What are the best books for the PTE reading section?

The best books for the PTE reading section are:

• PTE Practice Test Plus with Answer Key
• Books 1 and 2 of the Expert PTE Academic Coursebook
• 2020 - 2022 PTE Academic Official Vocabulary
• The Official Guide to PTE Academic by Pearson
• An Introduction to PTE Academic
• PTE Prep: Offline Practice Test
• PTE Exam Preparation 2025