English Vocabulary
English Vocabulary has 227 concepts, grouped by level below. Open one to read how it works, try practice items, and ask a question.
Absolute Beginner
- Classroom words and instructions Listen, repeat, open, again — the words a lesson runs on.
- Everyday objects The things in a bag, a room, and a pocket.
- Family words Mother, father, brother, sister, and the near ones.
- Food and drink words What you can order and what you can buy.
- Greetings and goodbyes Hello, good morning, see you, and the rest.
- Numbers 0 to 20 The numbers a learner needs on day one.
- The alphabet Twenty-six letters, by name.
Beginner
- A typical day The routine from waking up to going to bed.
- Activities Things people do for pleasure, as -ing forms.
- Clothes What people wear, and describing an outfit.
- Colors and common adjectives Basic colors and the adjectives used most often with them.
- Countries Naming where people and things come from.
- Directions and prepositions of place Asking the way and following the answer.
- Everyday verb phrases get up, go to work, have lunch, and the rest of a day.
- Food and drink Everyday meals, drinks, and ordering them.
- Free-time verb phrases What people do with a weekend.
- Hotels Rooms, keys, reception, and what is in a room.
- In the classroom Objects, instructions, and the phrases for asking about them.
- Inviting and offering Asking someone to do something, and offering to help.
- Jobs and places of work What people do and where they do it.
- Kinds of movies Genres, and saying what you think of one.
- Months and ordinal numbers Saying the date.
- More verb phrases Common actions that pair with can and can't.
- Nationalities The adjective that goes with each country.
- Numbers 0 to 10, days of the week, and goodbyes The first words you need to arrange anything.
- People and family Immediate family and the words for describing people.
- Phone numbers and numbers 11 to 100 Saying and hearing longer numbers.
- Prepositions in, on, at for time and place Which one goes with a time, a day, and a place.
- Prepositions of place — in, on, under Saying where something is.
- Prices and paying Money, prices, and buying something small.
- Regular verbs Everyday verbs that take -ed in the past.
- Saying how you feel Tired, hungry, cold, and the rest.
- Small everyday objects What people carry in a bag or pocket.
- Souvenirs and gifts Things you buy to take home.
- Telling the time Clock times and the phrases that go with them.
- Traveling Getting somewhere: tickets, bags, and arriving.
- Verb phrases with get, go, have, and do The four verbs that carry most of everyday English.
Elementary
- Adverbs and expressions of frequency always, hardly ever, twice a week.
- Cardinal numbers 1–20 Recognizing and using numbers 1 through 20.
- City vacations Getting away for a few days.
- Classroom language Instructions, requests, and asking about words.
- Colors Common color words.
- Common adverbs quickly, carefully, well, badly.
- Common descriptive adjectives Everyday adjectives describing size, temperature, and age, and their opposites.
- Common food and drink vocabulary Everyday food and drink words.
- Countries and nationalities Where people are from and the adjective for it.
- Daily routine The order of an ordinary day.
- Days of the week Names and order of the seven days of the week.
- Directions Asking the way and following the answer.
- Feelings Tired, worried, excited, and the rest.
- Food and drink — meals and dishes Extending everyday food vocabulary to whole meals.
- Food containers A carton, a jar, a packet.
- Greetings & Introductions — core phrases Common greetings and self-introductions for first meetings.
- High numbers Hundreds, thousands, and millions.
- Immediate family vocabulary Common words for immediate family members.
- In a hotel Checking in, rooms, and asking staff for help.
- Irregular past participles The third form, and where it differs from the past.
- Irregular verbs The past forms that have to be learned.
- Jobs What people do for a living.
- Modifiers — very, really, quite Turning an adjective up or down.
- Months and seasons Names of the twelve months and the four seasons.
- Music Genres, instruments, and talking about taste.
- Noise — verbs and verb phrases Sounds people and places make.
- Past time expressions yesterday, last week, two years ago.
- Phones and the internet Devices, apps, and what people do with them.
- Places and buildings What a town is made of.
- Prepositions of place and movement Where something is, and which way it goes.
- Public transport Getting across a city.
- Tens and compound numbers 21–100 Forming compound numbers like 'thirty-four' and recognizing multiples of ten up to 100.
- The date and ordinal numbers Saying and writing dates.
- The house Rooms, furniture, and what is in them.
- The weather and seasons Describing weather, and the time of year.
- Things in a room — in, on, under Everyday objects and where they are.
- Understanding a menu Courses, dishes, and ordering.
- Verb phrases for predictions The actions a fortune-teller deals in.
- Verb phrases with go, have, and get Three verbs that carry most of everyday English.
- Verbs that take the infinitive The verbs that must be followed by to.
- Word formation — write to writer Building a person-noun from a verb.
- Words in a story The vocabulary a short narrative runs on.
Pre-Intermediate
- Adjectives ending in -ed and -ing The difference between bored and boring, interested and interesting.
- Adjectives followed by a preposition Pairs such as afraid of, interested in, good at, and worried about.
- Adverbs of manner Forming and using adverbs such as carefully, quickly, and well.
- Animals and insects Wild animals, pets, farm animals, and common insects.
- Asking for and giving directions Street directions, landmarks, and public transport instructions.
- At hotel reception Checking in, reporting a problem with a room, and asking staff for help.
- At the airport Check-in, security, boarding, arrivals, and delays.
- Clothes and accessories Everyday clothing, footwear, and accessories, with wear, carry, and a pair of.
- Common everyday verb phrases High-frequency phrases built on have, go, get, do, and make.
- Common phrasal verbs Everyday two-word verbs such as turn off, look after, and give up.
- Countries, nationalities, and languages Naming the people and the languages of different countries.
- Describing a town or city Buildings, facilities, atmosphere, and what a place is like to live in.
- Describing appearance — hair, height, and build Answering What does he look like? with hair, height, and build.
- Easily confused verbs Pairs such as lend and borrow, win and earn, bring and take.
- Feeling ill — symptoms and remedies Common symptoms, asking at a pharmacy, and simple treatments.
- Housework and chores Everyday jobs around the home and how often they get done.
- In a restaurant Booking a table, ordering, asking about dishes, and paying the bill.
- Life events and biographies be born, grow up, get married, retire, and other stages of a life.
- make or do? Which collocations take make and which take do.
- Meanings of get get meaning receive, become, arrive, and buy, plus common phrases with get.
- Modifiers — very, really, quite, a bit Making an adjective stronger or weaker.
- On the phone Making, answering, and ending a call, and taking a message.
- Paraphrasing — explaining a word you don't know Phrases such as It's a kind of, You use it for, and It's the opposite of.
- Personality adjectives and their opposites Pairs such as friendly and unfriendly, generous and mean, lazy and hard-working.
- Phrases with back come back, go back, pay back, call back, and give back.
- Prepositions of place Positioning things with in, on, under, behind, between, and opposite.
- Prepositions of time and place — at, in, on Choosing the right preposition for clock times, dates, months, and locations.
- Question words who, what, which, where, when, why, how, whose, and how plus an adjective.
- Reading numbers aloud Decimals, fractions, percentages, dates, phone numbers, and prices.
- Returning and exchanging goods Receipts, refunds, exchanges, and explaining what is wrong with an item.
- say or tell? Which verb takes a person as its object, and the fixed phrases each one takes.
- School subjects and school life Subjects, schedules, tests, and school routines.
- Shopping and paying Shops, prices, receipts, sales, and ways of paying.
- Sports and physical activity Sports, the verbs play, do, and go, and the places where sport happens.
- Talking about fear Words such as scared, terrified, nervous, and phobia.
- Talking about similarities and differences Phrases such as we both, in common, the same as, and different from.
- The body, health, and staying well Parts of the body, common symptoms, and healthy habits.
- Time expressions in a narrative a few minutes later, by the time, as soon as, and in the end.
- Time phrases with for and since Which duration phrases follow for and which follow since.
- Vacations and travel Booking, packing, sightseeing, and describing a trip.
- Verb phrases for telling a story Phrases such as get lost, run away, and break down that keep a narrative moving.
- Verbs and their opposites Pairs such as find and lose, remember and forget, arrive and leave.
- Verbs followed by a preposition Fixed pairs such as arrive in, wait for, depend on, and listen to.
- Verbs followed by the -ing form Patterns such as enjoy, hate, don't mind, and spend time.
- Verbs followed by the infinitive Patterns such as try to, forget to, decide to, and promise to.
- Word building — making nouns Forming nouns from verbs and adjectives with -ment, -tion, -ness, and -ity.
Intermediate
- Adjectives ending -ed and -ing How you feel against what caused it.
- Compound nouns Two nouns acting as one, and where the stress goes.
- Crime Offences, people, and the justice process.
- Education Schools, subjects, exams, and qualifications.
- Electronic devices Devices, and what people do with them.
- Family and adjectives of personality Relationships, and what people are like.
- Food and cooking Ingredients, methods, and describing a dish.
- Houses Rooms, features, and describing where you live.
- Making adjectives and adverbs Suffixes that turn one part of speech into another.
- Money Earning, spending, saving, and owing.
- Movies Genres, people, and the language of a review.
- Phone language Calls, messages, and phone etiquette.
- Relationships Meeting, getting on, falling out, and staying together.
- Shopping, and making nouns from verbs Buying and returning, with the noun forms that go with it.
- Sport Games, players, places, and results.
- Strong adjectives exhausted, amazed, freezing — and the modifiers they take.
- The body Parts of the body, and gestures.
- Transport Getting around, and what goes wrong.
- Verbs and adjectives with prepositions The fixed pairings that have to be learned whole.
- Work Jobs, conditions, applying, and leaving.
Intermediate Plus
- Adjective suffixes Turning nouns and verbs into adjectives.
- At a restaurant Booking, ordering, complaining, and paying.
- British and American English Words that differ across the two.
- Cash machines and money phrasal verbs Getting money out, and the verbs that go with it.
- DIY, repairs, and paraphrasing Fixing things, and describing a tool you cannot name.
- Exams Preparing, sitting, and the language of results.
- Historic buildings, wars, and battles Places with a past, and the events in them.
- Live entertainment Concerts, theater, tickets, and audiences.
- Looking after yourself Health, treatments, and self-care.
- Names First names, last names, nicknames, and what people are called.
- Packing and travel preparation What goes in the bag, and what gets forgotten.
- Photography Taking, editing, and describing pictures.
- Shops and services Where people go, and what they ask for.
- Stages of life Childhood to old age, and the events between.
- Study and work Courses, applications, jobs, and CVs.
- Television Shows, viewing habits, and opinions.
- The country and rural life Landscape, wildlife, and living outside a city.
- Trash and recycling Waste, sorting it, and the language of doing better.
- Weddings The event, the people, and the customs.
- Word building Prefixes and suffixes that shift a word between classes.
Upper-Intermediate
- Adverbs and adverbial phrases Manner, degree, time, and comment.
- Advertising and business Campaigns, markets, and commercial language.
- Air travel Airports, flights, and everything that delays them.
- Clothes and fashion Garments, styles, and describing an outfit.
- Collocation — word pairs The combinations that sound native and the ones that do not.
- Compound adjectives and modifiers well-known, hard-working, and the adverbs that grade them.
- Crime and punishment Offences, the process, and the outcome.
- Expressing feelings with verbs and -ed/-ing adjectives Two grammatical routes to the same feeling.
- Expressions with take take part, take place, take after, and the rest.
- Illnesses and injuries Symptoms, conditions, and treatment.
- Science Research, evidence, and discovery.
- Sleep Rest, insomnia, dreams, and habits.
- The environment and weather Climate, conditions, and environmental problems.
- The media Outlets, formats, and how a story travels.
- Verbs often confused Pairs that look alike and behave differently.
- Word building — prefixes and suffixes Building a family of words from one root.
- Working out meaning from context Strategies for an unknown word in a real text.
Advanced
- Animal matters Animals, and the idioms drawn from them.
- Art and color idioms The visual arts, and the idioms color supplies.
- Compound adjectives Two-part adjectives, and how they are built.
- Conflict and warfare The vocabulary of dispute, from argument to war.
- Describing books and movies Plot, character, craft, and judgment.
- Expressions with time The idioms and collocations built on time.
- Finance
- Health and medicine, and similes Clinical vocabulary, and the comparisons English reaches for.
- Lexical areas and semantic fields How vocabulary clusters, and how to learn it that way.
- Personality Precise character description, beyond the obvious adjectives.
- Phones, technology, and adjectives with prepositions Devices, and the prepositions their adjectives demand.
- Phrases with get The idioms and collocations built on get.
- Preparing food Technique, texture, and the language of cooking.
- Sounds and the human voice How things sound, and how people speak.
- Travel and tourism Places, journeys, and the industry around them.
- Word building — abstract nouns Turning verbs and adjectives into abstractions.
- Word building — adjectives, nouns, and verbs Moving one root across word classes.
- Word formation — prefixes Negative, quantitative, and attitudinal prefixes.
- Words that are often confused Near neighbors that are not interchangeable.
Advanced Plus
- Acronyms and initialisms Abbreviations, and how they are said.
- Binomials Fixed word pairs joined by and or or.
- Common adverb collocations, and verbs for making things The adverbs that pair naturally, and the verbs of construction.
- Connotation Words with the same denotation and different weight.
- Eating and drinking Precise culinary and gustatory vocabulary.
- Idioms from Shakespeare The phrases the language kept.
- Individuals and populations The language of demography and society.
- Numbers and measurements Quantities, units, and reading figures aloud.
- Phrasal nouns Nouns built from phrasal verbs.
- Prefixes and suffixes Building and unbuilding words at speed.
- Punishment The vocabulary of sanction and justice.
- Research language Studies, findings, evidence, and hedging.
- Sophisticated emotions Emotional vocabulary beyond the everyday.
- Vague language sort of, or something, and the rest — imprecision used deliberately.
- Ways of moving The precise verbs English has for movement.
- Ways of seeing The verbs and nouns of perception and viewpoint.
Proficiency
- Collocation at the edge of acceptability The pairings a native speaker allows and the ones they do not.
- Connotation and semantic prosody Words that mean the same thing and carry different weight.
- Euphemism and understatement Saying less than you mean, deliberately.
- Humor, irony, and wordplay The vocabulary of not meaning it.
- Idiomatic language in current use Idiom that is alive, not dictionary idiom.
- Loanwords and borrowed phrases What English took, and how it says it now.
- Metaphor in everyday language The metaphors buried in ordinary words.
- Regional and cultural variation The same language, differently in each place.
- Register — formal, neutral, and colloquial Choosing the level of the room.
- Specialist and technical vocabulary Reading and using the language of a field you do not work in.