IELTS Listening Test 16 (2026) with Answers

Teacher section. Do not give this to learners before they take the test.

Original IELTS-style practice material. Not produced or endorsed by IELTS, the British Council, IDP or Cambridge University Press & Assessment.

Note: A script alone does not reproduce a timed audio test. In the real test, candidates hear each recording once, at natural speed, with fixed pauses. If you read these scripts aloud, keep to the pause lengths shown and do not repeat anything.

Pause markers: [PAUSE 30s] means 30 seconds of silence. In the actual recording, each pause is silence only.

Answer locations: In this teacher copy, the words that give each answer are marked like this: ⟦Q1⟧. Remove these markers before recording.

PART 1

Speakers: NARRATOR; TYLER (male, receptionist at a climbing centre in Denver, upbeat and helpful, American accent); INGRID (female, a Swedish engineer who has just moved to Denver for work, polite and practical, Swedish accent)

NARRATOR: Part 1. You will hear a woman who has just arrived at a climbing centre talking to the receptionist. First, you have some time to look at questions 1 to 6.

[PAUSE 30s]

NARRATOR: Now listen carefully and answer questions 1 to 6.

TYLER: Hi there, welcome to Highline. How can I help?

INGRID: Hello. I'd like to start climbing here, but I've never been before. A colleague at work recommended you.

TYLER: Awesome. Have you climbed indoors anywhere else?

INGRID: A little, in Sweden, years ago. But I've forgotten most of it, I think.

TYLER: No problem. Everyone who's new to Highline does an induction first, even people with a lot of experience. It's a short session with one of our instructors. They show you how to tie in, how to hold the rope for a partner, and how to fall safely on the bouldering mats.

INGRID: How long does it take?

TYLER: ⟦Q1⟧ It's forty-five minutes. We run one every hour on weekends, and every evening at six and seven.

INGRID: And is there a charge for it?

TYLER: It's thirty dollars, and that includes your climbing shoes for the day, and ⟦Q2⟧ you also get to use a harness. You don't need to bring any equipment at all for your first visit.

INGRID: That sounds good. And after the induction, how much is it to climb?

TYLER: You can buy a day pass each time you come. ⟦Q3⟧ That's twenty-four dollars, and you can stay as long as you like. Or there's a ten-visit card, which works out a bit cheaper.

INGRID: I think I'd like to come two or three times a week, if I enjoy it.

TYLER: Then membership is probably better for you. Full membership is seventy-nine dollars a month, and you can climb any time we're open. We also have off-peak membership, which is cheaper, but you can only use it before four o'clock on weekdays, and ⟦Q4⟧ it's only for students. You'd need to show a student card.

INGRID: Ah, I'm not a student any more, unfortunately. I'll probably take the full membership, but I'll do the induction first and see.

TYLER: Sounds like a plan. There are just a couple of things you need before you climb. We'll need some photo ID, and you'll sign a form to say you understand the risks. Is anyone climbing with you?

INGRID: Maybe my son, later. He's fourteen.

TYLER: He's welcome. ⟦Q5⟧ For anyone under sixteen, a parent has to sign the form, and they also have to stay in the building while their kid's climbing.

INGRID: That's fine. Is there somewhere to leave my bag?

TYLER: Yes, there are lockers in the changing rooms. They're free, but ⟦Q6⟧ you need to bring a padlock, because we don't supply them. Any small padlock will work.

NARRATOR: Before you hear the rest of the conversation, you have some time to look at questions 7 to 10.

[PAUSE 30s]

NARRATOR: Now listen and answer questions 7 to 10.

TYLER: Would you like me to show you around the ground floor before you go?

INGRID: Yes, please.

TYLER: OK, so we're at reception now, next to the main entrance. The tall wall on your left, the one that runs along most of that side of the building, is the main climbing wall. That's where you'll use ropes. And the area on the right side, with the thick blue mats, is the bouldering area. The walls there are lower, so you don't need a rope.

INGRID: I see.

TYLER: The room just to the left of reception is our office. That's staff only. ⟦Q7⟧ The room on the other side of reception, on the right, is shoe hire. You'll pick up your shoes there before the induction.

INGRID: OK.

TYLER: Then if you walk straight ahead from reception, you come into the warm-up area, with the stretching mats. And behind that are the stairs that go up to the yoga studio. ⟦Q8⟧ The room to the right of the stairs is the first-aid room. It has a red door, so it's easy to find. All our staff are trained in first aid.

INGRID: Good to know. And the room on the other side of the stairs?

TYLER: ⟦Q9⟧ That's the children's zone, on the left of the stairs. It has small walls with bright colours for kids under ten. Your son would be too old for it, though.

INGRID: Yes, he'd hate that!

TYLER: Then right at the back of the building, there's the café. The room in the top-left corner, next to the café, is the changing rooms, with the lockers. ⟦Q10⟧ And the room on the other side of the café, on its right, is our training room. We run strength classes in there, and you'll do the theory part of your induction there too.

INGRID: And the room in the far corner, on the right?

TYLER: That's just storage. We keep spare mats and ropes in there.

INGRID: Great. Thank you, Tyler. Can I book an induction for Thursday evening?

TYLER: Sure, let me check the system.

NARRATOR: That is the end of Part 1. You now have half a minute to check your answers.

[PAUSE 30s]

PART 2

Speakers: NARRATOR; MOSES (male, a senior safari guide at a camp in Kenya, warm and well organised, Kenyan accent)

NARRATOR: Part 2. You will hear a safari guide talking to a group of guests on their first evening at a camp in Kenya. First, you have some time to look at questions 11 to 16.

[PAUSE 30s]

NARRATOR: Now listen carefully and answer questions 11 to 16.

MOSES: Good evening, everyone, and welcome to Acacia Hill Camp. My name is Moses, and I've been a guide here in the Maasai Mara for nearly fifteen years. I'll be looking after you while you're with us, so please come to me with any questions at all. First, I'd like to go through our daily programme, because it's quite different from a normal holiday.

The day starts early. The best time to see animals is just after sunrise, when it's cool and the lions and cheetahs are still active, so the morning game drive leaves at six fifteen. We'll knock on your tent door at half past five. There's no time for a proper meal before we go, but we'll serve hot drinks in the vehicle, and ⟦Q11⟧ there's a warm blanket on every seat, because it's cold at that time of the morning.

We usually come back at about half past nine, so breakfast is at ten o'clock. It's a full cooked breakfast, and ⟦Q12⟧ it's served on the terrace of the main tent, where you have a lovely view over the plains.

At half past eleven there's a guided bush walk, which is optional. It's a wonderful way to learn about the smaller things, the insects, the plants, the tracks in the soil. You'll walk with me and an armed ranger. You don't need special boots, normal trainers are fine, but ⟦Q13⟧ you must wear long trousers, because some of the grasses are very sharp, and there are ticks.

After lunch, at half past two, we'll visit the conservation centre, which is just ten minutes' drive away. The centre does a lot of work protecting the rhinos in this area. There are only a small number of them, and ⟦Q14⟧ the rangers now use drones to follow the rhinos without disturbing them. They'll show you how it's done.

The evening game drive leaves at four o'clock. In the evening you have a good chance of seeing elephants and, if we're lucky, leopards. At the end of the drive, ⟦Q15⟧ we stop on a hill and have drinks while we watch the sun go down. It's my favourite moment of the day.

Then dinner is at half past seven. It's a set menu, but tell us if you have any special requirements. ⟦Q16⟧ We eat outside, around the fire, so bring a warm jacket, because it gets cold at night up here.

NARRATOR: Before you hear the rest of the talk, you have some time to look at questions 17 to 20.

[PAUSE 30s]

NARRATOR: Now listen and answer questions 17 to 20.

MOSES: Now, a few words about the vehicles. They're open at the sides, so you can take photographs easily. There are no seatbelts in the back, which surprises some people, but we drive slowly, and the roads in the reserve are rough. What I do ask is that ⟦Q17-18⟧ you stay in your seat whenever the vehicle is moving. If we brake suddenly, you could fall. Once we've stopped, you're welcome to stand up and look out through the roof.

When we're close to animals, they're not frightened by the vehicle itself, because they're used to it. But they are disturbed by human voices, so ⟦Q17-18⟧ please keep your voices low when we're near them. Whispering is best.

Some guides ask guests to swap seats during the drive, so that everyone gets a turn by the window. We don't need to do that here, because every seat has a window. And you're welcome to bring snacks in the vehicle, as long as you take your rubbish back with you.

Finally, let me tell you what we provide. ⟦Q19-20⟧ There's a pair of binoculars in your tent, and you can take them on every drive. There's no charge for those. Many guests ask about hats. We sell hats in the camp shop, but we don't give them out, so do buy one if you didn't bring your own. The sun is very strong here. ⟦Q19-20⟧ Insect spray is free. You'll find it at the bar, and please help yourselves, especially in the evenings. If you need to charge your phone or camera, you can do that in the main tent, but there's a small fee of two dollars per item, because our power comes from a generator at night. There aren't any torches in the tents, because the paths are lit at night, but if you'd like one, they're for sale in the shop.

Right. Are there any questions before dinner?

NARRATOR: That is the end of Part 2. You now have half a minute to check your answers.

[PAUSE 30s]

PART 3

Speakers: NARRATOR; CHIOMA (female, a sports science student, calm and precise, Nigerian accent); ETHAN (male, a sports science student, energetic and talkative, southern English accent)

NARRATOR: Part 3. You will hear two sports science students, Chioma and Ethan, discussing a study they carried out on how music affects people's performance during exercise. First, you have some time to look at questions 21 to 24.

[PAUSE 30s]

NARRATOR: Now listen carefully and answer questions 21 to 24.

ETHAN: OK, Chioma, so we need to write up the method section by Friday. Shall we start with why we chose bikes? Dr Moore's bound to ask.

CHIOMA: Yes. People will expect a running machine, because most studies of music and exercise use running.

ETHAN: Right. And we did think about it. The gym had plenty of treadmills free.

CHIOMA: It wasn't about availability. And nobody said they'd be nervous about running with headphones on, although I did wonder about that at the beginning. ⟦Q21⟧ The real reason was that on an exercise bike, we can set the resistance and measure exactly how hard someone is working. On a running machine, people change their stride and lean on the handles, so it's much harder to measure the effort.

ETHAN: True. OK, and then the background. You read most of the earlier studies, didn't you?

CHIOMA: I did, and the thing that struck me was who took part in them. I expected them to be mostly elite athletes, but actually most used ordinary university students. ⟦Q22⟧ The problem was that nearly all of them were men. Very few women had ever been tested, which is why we made sure our group was half and half.

ETHAN: And most of those studies were short, weren't they? One or two sessions?

CHIOMA: Some were, but there were plenty of longer ones too. That's not something we need to mention.

ETHAN: OK. What about the music? I remember we argued about that.

CHIOMA: We did. In the end, ⟦Q23⟧ we used instrumental music only, with no singing, so that the words wouldn't affect people's mood. You wanted each person to bring their own favourite songs.

ETHAN: Well, people work harder to music they love. That's well known.

CHIOMA: Yes, but then we couldn't control the tempo, the speed of the beat. And the playlist the gym instructor offered us had words in every song. So we chose instrumental pieces and just changed the tempo electronically.

ETHAN: Right. And then the results. I'll be honest, I expected the fast music to win easily, and it did for most people. Our fittest participants improved with it just as much as everyone else.

CHIOMA: And they all said they enjoyed it.

ETHAN: Yeah. But ⟦Q24⟧ what I really didn't expect was that for three of the participants, the slow music actually helped more than the fast music. They covered more distance with it.

CHIOMA: That was interesting. They were all people who do a lot of long-distance cycling, so maybe they're used to keeping a steady rhythm.

NARRATOR: Before you hear the rest of the conversation, you have some time to look at questions 25 to 30.

[PAUSE 30s]

NARRATOR: Now listen and answer questions 25 to 30.

ETHAN: OK, let's write out the procedure, step by step. Each participant came in four times, didn't they?

CHIOMA: Yes. But on the first visit, before anything else, ⟦Q25⟧ they filled in a questionnaire about how often they exercise, and what kind of music they usually listen to.

ETHAN: And then we measured their height and weight.

CHIOMA: That was in the questionnaire too, actually. They gave us those themselves. Then, every session started the same way. ⟦Q26⟧ They did a five-minute warm-up on the bike, at a low resistance.

ETHAN: And then the main part. Ten minutes of cycling, as hard as they could manage, with music at either slow, medium or fast tempo.

CHIOMA: And we need to explain that we changed only the tempo. ⟦Q27⟧ We kept the volume exactly the same in every session, because louder music can make people work harder too.

ETHAN: Right. And then the fourth session was the one without music.

CHIOMA: Yes, ⟦Q28⟧ they did one session in silence, so we could compare. And we changed the order of the sessions for each person, so that they didn't just get better with practice.

ETHAN: OK. Now, what did we actually measure? The bike gave us the speed, but that changes all the time.

CHIOMA: ⟦Q29⟧ The figure we used was the total distance, which the bike records automatically. That's our main result.

ETHAN: And then there were the chest straps.

CHIOMA: Yes, ⟦Q30⟧ each participant wore a chest strap that recorded their heart rate for the whole ten minutes. We'd hoped to measure their breathing rate as well, but the straps we borrowed couldn't do that.

ETHAN: And then they had a rest before they went home. Do we need to include that?

CHIOMA: I don't think so. Nothing was measured then. But we should say that they were asked how hard they felt they'd worked, on a scale of one to ten.

ETHAN: Good point. I'll add that.

NARRATOR: That is the end of Part 3. You now have half a minute to check your answers.

[PAUSE 30s]

PART 4

Speakers: NARRATOR; LECTURER (female, university lecturer in civil engineering, clear and lively, Australian accent)

NARRATOR: Part 4. You will hear a lecturer giving a talk about how engineers check that bridges are safe. First, you have some time to look at questions 31 to 40.

[PAUSE 45s]

NARRATOR: Now listen carefully and answer questions 31 to 40.

LECTURER: Good afternoon, everyone. Most of us cross bridges every day without giving them a second thought. But many of the road bridges in use today were built fifty or sixty years ago, for lighter and fewer vehicles than they carry now. So keeping them safe has become one of the biggest jobs in civil engineering. Today I'm going to look at the main methods engineers use to inspect bridges, and then at what they're actually looking for.

The oldest method, and still the most common, is simply looking. A trained inspector walks the bridge, and underneath it where possible, and records every crack, every patch of damaged paint and every loose bolt, usually with photographs. It's cheap, and an experienced inspector notices a great deal. ⟦Q31⟧ The weakness, of course, is that the eye can only see the outside of the structure. Damage hidden inside a beam won't show up until it's already serious.

So the second method is designed to get beneath the surface, and it's surprisingly low-tech. Inspectors tap the concrete with a hammer, or drag a heavy chain across the deck, and listen. Solid concrete gives a clear ring. ⟦Q32⟧ But where the concrete has separated inside, leaving an empty space, the sound is dull. It takes practice, but a good inspector can map these areas quite accurately.

The third method is one you've probably seen in the news: drones. Inspecting the side or the underneath of a tall bridge has always been difficult. Often the only way was to send inspectors over the edge, hanging from ropes, which is slow and risky, or to close the road and bring in a special truck with a long arm. ⟦Q33⟧ A drone with a high-quality camera can do much of that work, so far fewer people need to be lowered on ropes. The drone doesn't replace the inspector, though. Someone still has to study the images and decide what they mean.

The fourth method is very different, because it doesn't depend on someone visiting the bridge at all. Engineers now fix small electronic sensors to key parts of a bridge. They measure things like how much the steel stretches when a heavy lorry passes, or how much the bridge moves in strong wind. ⟦Q34⟧ The sensors send their readings to a computer twenty-four hours a day, for years at a time, so engineers can see slow changes that a visit every few years would miss.

And the last method is the most dramatic. ⟦Q35⟧ Before a new bridge carries any public traffic, it's often given a load test. Engineers drive a line of heavy lorries, loaded with gravel, onto the bridge, and measure exactly how much it bends. If it behaves as the designers predicted, it's ready to open.

I should also mention satellites. Some researchers are using radar measurements from satellites to detect movements of just a few millimetres in bridges across a whole country. It's very promising, but it's still at the trial stage, so it isn't part of normal inspections yet.

So what are inspectors looking for? For steel bridges, the answer is simple. ⟦Q36⟧ The biggest threat to a steel bridge is rust. That's why steel bridges have to be repainted regularly. Concrete bridges have a hidden version of the same problem. Concrete is strengthened with steel bars inside it, and in countries with cold winters, the salt that's spread on roads to melt ice can slowly work its way through the concrete. ⟦Q37⟧ When it reaches the steel inside, it attacks it, and the steel expands and cracks the concrete from within.

People are often alarmed when they see cracks in a bridge, but most concrete has small cracks, and they're not a problem in themselves. ⟦Q38⟧ What engineers really want to know is whether a crack is growing. That's why inspectors measure and photograph the same cracks on every visit.

Sadly, the importance of all this was shown in 2018, when a motorway bridge collapsed in the Italian city of Genoa, and forty-three people were killed. The disaster led to a review of bridges across the country, and in 2020 ⟦Q39⟧ Italy introduced new national guidelines for inspecting bridges and deciding which ones needed urgent repair.

Finally, the future. Several countries are now building what's called a ⟦Q40⟧ digital twin of each major bridge. That's a detailed computer model, which is updated with real data from the sensors and inspections. Engineers can then test the model, for example with heavier traffic, and predict where problems are likely to develop, before they appear on the real bridge.

NARRATOR: That is the end of Part 4. You now have one minute to check your answers.

[PAUSE 60s]

NARRATOR: That is the end of the Listening test. In the IELTS test, you would now have ten minutes to transfer your answers to the answer sheet.