TOEFL IBT exam includes 4 sessions which are reading, listening, speaking, and writing. The score range for each section is from 0-30. If you answer all the questions in the TOEFL test wrongly then you will get 0 points for that section. However, if you can answer them all correctly your score for that section will be 30. The test result is calculated in a way that the score for each section is summed up to calculate the total score. Therefore, the maximum score to attain in TOEFL is 120 and the minimum score to attain is 0. Let us now analyze what the TOEFL passing scores are.
TOEFL Passing Scores
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TOEFL exam can not be passed or failed. It is a type of exam that you receive a certain score that can be used to apply for different institutions such as universities, jobs, or for immigration. For that reason, the requirements for the institutions to be applied should be carefully checked before handing in the TOEFL certificate. Not only do the requirements vary for each university, but also different programs within the same university.
As an example, if you were to apply for a Ph.D. program in psychology at Harvard university the minimum score requirement would be 80. However, for the LLM program at Harvard university the TOEFL score requirement would be 100 and with a minimum of 25 in each section. Therefore, it is vitally important to check the TOEFL requirement before taking the test.
Can you fail on TOEFL test?
This is also a commonly asked question among the test-takers. The answer here is again “No”. Since there is no TOEFL passing score it is also not possible to fail this exam. After your exam is submitted and your score is ready. It won’t be containing any information about your failing or passing. The TOEFL exam certificate therefore will only show your performance in the exam on different sections.
If you have taken the test multiple times and still couldn’t pass it is important to ask you the following question “Why do you fail in TOEFL?“. based on your answer you need to take action and start gathering a TOEFL study plan to get going.
Can you retake TOEFL ibt Test?
The short answer is “Yes“. You can take the TOEFL test as many as possible as long as there is a 3 days difference between your last TOEFL sit with the current one. The only obstacle here could be from the university side. Because most of the universities have a certain date for accepting the applications. If the required TOEFL score can not be certified until the application time, the university may no longer accept the application afterward. Thus, the application deadlines for delivering the required TOEFL score can limit your TOEFL retake time.
It is also possible to submit the best score you have got on all your TOEFL tests. This means that even if you get a lower score from your previous try you can still submit your best score to the university or any other institution as long as it was taken no more than 2 years ago. To find out what your best TOEFL score is you can check the MyBest score from your ETS account.
However, some institutions do not accept the MyBest score. It is, therefore, suggested to check the requirements of the admission office to get certain on whether MyBest score can be valid or not.
Summary
The newbies on the TOEFL exam might get confused on how to pass or not fail on TOEFL. As we have explained during this article there is no TOEFL passing score. This also means that the TOEFL test takers can not also fail. It is possible to take the TOEFL IBT test multiple times if needed. However, the application deadline should be checked. In addition to that MyBest score, the feature can be used to hand in the best TOEFL score report for the application.