Official Cambridge English Resources: Verified Links for B1, B2 and C1 Candidates

How to use this list

The official Cambridge English website is cambridgeenglish.org, run by Cambridge University Press & Assessment. For B2 First, C1 Advanced and B1 Preliminary, five kinds of official page matter: the format page for each exam, the preparation page (free sample tests and Speaking videos with examiner comments), the exam dates page and its PDFs, the centre finder, and the results pages. Every link below was checked on 20 or 21 October 2026, and each row says whether we read the page or only found it linked. Older addresses such as /exams-and-tests/first/exam-format/ still work and redirect to the current /qualifications/ paths we use here. Bookmark this page rather than the individual links: when Cambridge moves a page or issues a new PDF version, we update it here first. TalkDrill is independent of Cambridge University Press & Assessment; we link the official material and never copy it.

Format pages and handbooks

The handbooks are written for teachers, but the Speaking chapter is the most useful thing a self-studying candidate can read: it prints the band descriptors the assessor uses. Our criteria and scale page explains them in plain English, and the part-by-part pages for B2 First, C1 Advanced and B1 Preliminary turn the format pages into tasks you can rehearse.

Free practice material: sample tests and Speaking videos

How to get the most out of the official Speaking videos (TalkDrill's method)

1. Watch the whole test once, with the examiner comments open beside it.
2. Watch again and pause after each interlocutor question. Answer it yourself, out loud, before the candidate does. Time your Part 2 long turn: one minute.
3. Read the comment on the criterion you find hardest, usually Interactive Communication or Discourse Management, and note one thing the candidate did that you did not.
4. Record yourself doing the same part with a partner, or with the AI partner in our paired practice bank, and mark it against the criteria.

Dates, centres and registration

Cambridge publishes no fee. For named centre prices and the registration steps in detail, see our fees and registration page; for every date in one table, the dates page.

Results, verification and certificates

What these pages say, in one place, is on our results and certificates page, including a worked Statement of Results.

Exam day, special arrangements and enquiries

Centre pages we cite

Some facts on this hub come from exam centres, not from Cambridge, because only centres publish fees and entry deadlines. We name each one and the date we read it:

• British Council Greece: fees (€98, €193, €197 for B1 Preliminary, B2 First, C1 Advanced), registration windows and Speaking dates. Read 21 Oct 2026.
• British Council Poland: fees (510, 860 and 910 PLN). Read 21 Oct 2026.
• IH Bristol exam dates and IH Bristol FAQs: deadlines, Speaking dates, the £45 late charge, enquiry fees. Read 21 Oct 2026.
• British Council Spain and British Council Italy: notices that they no longer deliver Cambridge exams (from 23 April 2023 and April 2023). Read 21 Oct 2026.
• British Council India: would not load past its cookie notice on 20 or 21 October 2026; we could not re-check it this week and quote nothing from it.

What the official material does not give you

Cambridge's free material is good and you should use all of it. But look at what it is made of: sample tests you can sit alone, videos you watch, comments you read and handbooks written for teachers. The Speaking paper is the one part of the exam you cannot rehearse with any of it, because it needs a second candidate. The Speaking samples sit inside the paper sample test downloads; nobody plays your partner, nobody times your one-minute long turn, and nobody tells you whether you interrupted, invited or ignored the other candidate. Interactive Communication is one of the four criteria, and it is the one you can only practise with someone else.

That is the gap TalkDrill's Cambridge pages are built to fill:

• The paired practice bank: timed tasks for B1, B2 and C1 with an AI partner who takes the second candidate's turns.
• The Part 2 phrases and Part 3 phrases pages, for the two parts where marks are won and lost.
• The eight-week plan, which schedules the official sample tests alongside daily speaking.
• Role-play practice, to build the habit of answering a partner instead of talking past one.

How we verify these links

Every week, with the dates check, we open each link, confirm it answers, and re-read any figure we quote from it. A row says "Read" when we fetched the page and read its text, and "Downloaded" when we saved the PDF and converted it to text. A row says "not opened" when the page is a login, a form, or a site that refused our automated reader, and we quote nothing from those. When Cambridge issues a new version of a dates PDF, we update the version number here, on the dates page and in the dates rows the same week.

Change log: 21 October 2026, page published with 43 official and centre links; the 2027 exam day flyer, the score conversion guide, the B1 Preliminary preparation page and the access arrangements page were read for the first time. Back to the Cambridge English hub.