C-Test Theory
Exam format, proven strategies, and the lexical and grammar patterns most frequently tested in the onSET C-test: organized as a path, not a pile.
“Late texts” marks topics that mostly pay off on the harder texts at the end of the run. Everything else pays off from the first text on.
The short route
7 articles · ~120 minSeven articles in the order they pay off. The route front-loads the most frequent gap types and deliberately skips the topics that together account for less than a fifth of all gaps.
Everything below is the full library, reachable directly from the task type it supports.
Strategy & Mechanics
0/4 doneFormat and method first: without these, the rest is guessing.
The C-Test Format
How a gap is constructed, how it is scored, and where the 15-second budget comes from.
A Complete Example: 20 Gaps in a Row
One full sample text, solved gap by gap, with mixed gap types.
A Second Complete Example: 20 Gaps at C1 Level
The harder sibling of the first sample text: the same routine on a denser, academic-adjacent text.
Lexis
0/5 doneHighest-impact gap type: about 44% of all onSET gaps are lexical — vocabulary, collocations, and function words. Word-internal structure (suffixes, compounds) lives in Word Formation below.
Vocabulary strategy: the 44 percent gap
Activate topic fields, complete word stems, and train the most frequent gap type systematically.
Function Words & Connectors
Articles, pronouns, and connectors — the most common gap fillers.
Collocations & Light Verbs
Fixed word pairs and light-verb constructions that make a gap nearly unambiguous.
Prepositions & Valency
The complete reference: every preposition list, verb-preposition pair, and contraction.
Forms & Inflection
0/9 doneHighest-leverage gap type: small endings, easy to drill, big point return.
Case System
Case: Article Tables
Recall both article tables instantly — the foundation for every case gap.
Case: Prepositions
The 10-second quick call: read fixed and two-way prepositions as the fastest case signals.
Agreement
Verb Morphology
Word Formation
0/3 doneThe word-internal half of that same 44%: compounds and suffixes let you recover an unfamiliar stem from its parts.
Word Formation: Suffixes
Deriving words via suffixes and reading off gender.