PTE Core Listening: Multiple Choice, Multiple Answers

You listen to a recording of 50 to 90 seconds, the longest in the Listening section, then answer a multiple-choice question about its content or tone where more than one option can be correct. You will see 1 to 2 of these items. As in the Reading section, the defining feature is the deduction: a wrong selection costs you a mark, so this is a task about restraint.

At a glance

Why the deduction changes everything

Pearson awards one point per correct response, deducts one point per incorrect response, and floors the item at zero. That makes each selection a bet rather than a free entry.

The practical rule: select an option only when you can point to something in the recording that supports it. Not something that sounds consistent with the topic, and not something the speaker might reasonably believe, but something they actually said. Three correct selections plus two wrong ones nets one point. Three correct selections alone nets three.

This is the opposite instinct to Listening: Fill in the Blanks and Write from Dictation, where there is no deduction and you should always write something. Both patterns exist in the same section, so identify the task before you answer.

Working a 90-second recording

The length is the real difficulty here. A minute and a half is long enough to contain several distinct claims, a change of direction, and more than one speaker's view, which is exactly the material distractors are built from.

1. Read the question and all the options before the audio starts. This is the highest-value habit on this task. Going in knowing what you are checking for turns passive listening into targeted listening.
2. Decide whether the question is about content or tone. A tone question means attending to how things are said, the hedges, emphasis, and attitude, rather than to the facts.
3. Track each option as you listen. Rather than trying to remember the whole recording, hold the options in mind and mark each one as supported, contradicted, or not mentioned.
4. Treat not mentioned as a rejection. This is where marks leak. An option that was never addressed feels safe because nothing disproved it, but selecting it costs a point exactly as a contradicted one does.
5. Where the recording has more than one speaker or view, keep track of who said what. Attributing a view to the wrong speaker is a standard distractor.
6. Commit and move on. The section is 22 to 37 minutes for 10 to 16 items. Reconsidering a long recording you can no longer hear rarely improves the answer.

The distractor patterns

• Mentioned but not endorsed. The speaker raises an idea in order to dismiss it. The words were in the recording; the claim was not made.
• Right claim, wrong speaker. Common where the recording is a discussion.
• Overstated. The speaker says something often happens; the option says it always does.
• Plausible but unmentioned. Reasonable given the topic, absent from the audio. Reject it.

How to practise it

Work these items in the question bank, and add one step to your review: for each option, write whether it was supported, contradicted, or not mentioned, and note which category your wrong selections fell into. Most people find their errors concentrate in the not mentioned category, and simply knowing that tightens their selecting noticeably.

Because the reasoning is close to its Reading counterpart, review the two together. Use AI Coach to work through items you found hard, and check pacing on a full practice test.

Related guides

• Listening: Multiple Choice, Single Answer, which has no deduction
• Highlight Incorrect Words, the other Listening task with a deduction
• Reading: Multiple Choice, Multiple Answers