Am I Fluent? From A1 To C2: The Six Language Levels Decoded

If you’re learning a new language, there are six possible language levels you can be at, from A1, beginner to C2, advanced.

In this blog post, you’re going to find out what these language levels are, what they mean, and what level you’re at right now! 

That way, you can answer the all important question – am I fluent?

By the way, if you prefer watching videos to reading, hit play on the video version of this post below. Otherwise keep scrolling to find out all about the different levels of learning a language.

What Are CEFR Language Levels?

Have you ever heard people say, “I speak French at a C1 level” or “I’m a B2 in Japanese” ?

Well, this alphabet soup is a system of language levels called the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages – CEFR for short

It organises language ability in six levels –  from A1, all the way up to C2. Each level describes what you can do at that stage, and how well you can do it.

Which is quite useful if you want to measure how far along you are.

Knowing what level is coming next can also be cool, because it gives you something to aim for. 

So, let’s get measuring! 

The A Levels: Basic User

A1 | Beginner

This is beginner, or A1!

We’ve all been there. In fact, you have to go through it to get anywhere else! 

Congratulations on deciding to learn a language. 

You’ve looked into it a little bit, and you know about 700 words, which is an awesome start.

At this level you can:

• speak slowly and with pauses, but you need to think about the words you want
• introduce yourself and tell people where you live in a simple way, with basic greeting
• ask others basic questions about themselves, like “What’s your name?” and “Where are you from?” As long as the other person speaks slowly, you can follow them

Everything you talk about is in the present tense. Very little is happening in the past or the future just yet! 

If you’re travelling, you can ask for and understand very basic directions from the locals, or find your own way around by reading simple signs. 

You can also write very basic descriptions of things. For example, you could write a postcard to send holiday greetings, or write down your name, nationality and address at a hotel. 

Good start!

In my experience, if you sit down and study every day, you can quite easily cross off the A1 level in a couple of months of study. Maybe a bit longer for harder languages.

It’s basically all a memory game at this stage. Everything is new to you, and you’ve just got to remember enough to build a basic competency in the language.

A2 | Elementary

By A2 level you’ve doubled your words to about 1500 and your sentences are smoother.

You can take part in everyday small talk and give your opinion, but still in very simple ways, and only on familiar topics. For example, “I like to go to the beach on Sundays.”

You’ll also finally manage to tell a waiter at a restaurant what you want, with more than just gesturing, which is always a great feeling!

On a practical level, it’s easier to approach native speakers and start a conversation at this stage because you’re no longer a complete beginner.

So you’ll be able to buy things at the shop and complete other simple daily tasks. But you still have to search for words, and maybe get a little help. 

If people are chatting, you can probably catch the topic and some of the main points as long as they’re speaking clearly and not too fast. 

As you get better, you can describe your own environment, your job, your family, your pets and routines.

And as long as someone’s telling you something directly, you can follow simple instructions and requests. And ask people to do things yourself or even make arrangements to meet.

One awesome thing is you’re no longer stuck in the present! So you’re able to talk about your own past, and things on your bucket list, like “I used to live in Portugal” or “next year I’m going to South America.”

With writing, you can manage a simple letter to tell someone what you’ve been doing. It will be really basic words, but you know where the nouns and verbs go. 

Now, vitally – reading will start to be possible at this stage because short, simple texts and stories will make sense to you now. 

And this really important, because reading is the real bridge to higher language levels, which means A2 is the perfect time to start reading in the language you’re learning.

Nothing too hard – my books of short stories were written for exactly this level in mind. The more you read, the faster you’ll get to the B levels! Speaking of which…

The B Levels: Independent User

B1 | Intermediate

By the time you get to B1 level, commonly known as intermediate, you know about 2500 words. And this is a big step up! 

In fact, B1 is an awesome place to be, because you feel like you’ve ‘arrived’ in the language. Things are starting to click. But don’t go writing ‘bilingual’ on your CV just yet – B doesn’t stand for bilingual!

So what are your awesome language skills?

Well, you’ve reached a place where you feel confident to speak. Conversation, for one, is way easier than before. As long as someone speaks to you in a standard dialect, you can keep a conversation going and get your meaning across. 

Your sentences still feel slow and a bit difficult. But you can describe experiences you’ve had, what your dreams and ambitions are, and what your opinion is about something.

You won’t be using fancy words yet, but you make sense and you get your point across. Okay, some people will still find you difficult to follow.

You pause to think about the grammar, and don’t know all the right words yet, but you can keep going!

At B1, you find it quite easy to cope with problems in everyday life, like if you have to ask for information or ask someone to repeat what they said. And you can also explain things quite well. For example, you can tell a doctor what’s wrong with you.

As for your writing, at B1 your writing has improved nicely. You can write a whole page of text about something simple – about everything you did on the weekend, for example. You know, that classic language school activity! 

And on the topic of the 4 skills (reading, writing, listening, reading), if you want to say that you have an A2 or B1 level, you have to be able to meet the competencies in all 4 skills. 

For example, it’s quite common for a language learner to be great at speaking, say B1, but have never studied writing at all. Technically speaking, this person can’t call themselves B1, because they can’t write. Does this matter? You be the judge of that. But it’s interesting to know!

And here’s a cool bonus: entertainment!

B1 is the point where watching movies for language learning gets more enjoyable. You can likely follow the plot as long as it’s not some crazy accent or topic. And this opens the door to a lot more input, even if you still need the subtitles on for now. 

B2 | Upper-Intermediate

B2 for me is the holy grail of language learning and I’ll explain why in a minute.

So at B2, you know about 4000 words and that feels amazing. At this point, you’ve built much more confidence and control in all of the learning areas.

And strangers can randomly just start chatting to you and you’ll feel comfortable to join in, even in a noisy cafe.

There's always this caveat where if someone speaks fast, with a strong accent, or on an unfamiliar topic, you’re still going to struggle. But you can make your own arguments, give pretty good explanations, and explain the advantages or disadvantages of something. 

At B2, you’ve also developed a lot of useful speaking strategies. For example, if you need to buy time to think of an answer, you’re able to say things like “That’s a difficult question to answer,” making your conversation much more natural.

Another skill is – and this is a useful one – you can notice if you said something wrong, and can correct your own mistakes. Again, that's another really important bridge to being able to improve on your own.

And what about reading? Well, I love this stage. You’re able to really enjoy longer stories, and you can understand the main ideas of a complex text, say, things that are going on in the world, or whatever. 

If you want to switch all of your social media over to the new language now, you’ll probably be fine!

Love writing essays? Blog posts? By now, you can write pretty darn well about all kinds of topics, especially about stuff you’re good at – using details and getting all the different tenses right.

The best way to judge a B2 level is something I call the Pub Test. If we can go to the pub and chat for a couple of hours, without me straining to understand you or you struggling to communicate, in other words, it’s a fully natural conversation, then you’re B2.

And it’s awesome!

The other crazy thing about B2 is that once you’ve reached this level, you’ll probably find that you never forget the language. Now I don’t know why this happens, but it’s a phenomenon that lots of people report.

I’ve studied around 10 languages to different degrees. And without fail, the languages that I’ve got to a B2 level in, I’ve never forgotten.

I still remember almost everything, even in languages like French, that I learnt to a B2 level over 20 years ago, and have barely spoken since. Although I’m a bit rusty, it’s all still there.

Now, other languages that I’ve only gotten to a B1 level in and then dropped I forget really quickly. And I feel like it’s gone.

It’s really interesting how this happens. So if you find yourself at B1 in a language and are wondering whether to continue or not, I would highly recommend that you carry on until you get to a solid B2, because then you’ll have the language for life! 

And how do you get from B1 to B2? Well, I recommend the StoryLearning method which gets you fluent in a new language thanks to stories, not rules.

So we’re at B2 Want more? Of course you do… 

The C Levels: Proficient User

C1 | Advanced

At C1, you know about 8000 words and almost understand the language like a pro. Fantastic! I say ‘almost’ because difficult subjects might still trip you up.

But are you fluent yet? Well, let’s see. You’re a very flexible speaker. You can have long conversations about pretty much anything.

And it doesn’t matter who you’re talking to – friends, bosses, strangers, officials – you can hold your own even when people are speaking fast.

Sometimes words still hide away in your memory, but if you don’t know the word, you easily find another way to say it by paraphrasing, which is a vital skill, by the way. 

When it comes to reading, by this point you can understand pretty much anything you read. Not because you know everything in the language, but because you’ve developed so many peripheral skills to be able to cope even when you don’t understand something.

By the way, that's something that native speakers have to do too. 

And at C1 you can create detailed writing of your own, too. You're still going to wonder about the best and most accurate way to express things. But it won’t hold you back – grammar is pretty natural at this point.

It’s a good day when you realise that you think in the new language. And it’s mostly accurate! 

One more thing that’s wonderful at C1 level is you can understand more subtle things like jokes, sarcasm, and so on.

Something I always remember is the first successful joke that I tell in another language –  a joke that actually works, and people laugh at. I think that’s a sign of C1 – it’s a kind of confidence that just builds over years

So are you fluent? Well, in my book you’re already fluent at B2. But I think I’m going to neatly sidestep the topic of how you define “fluency” here, because it’s a bit of a minefield.

In most cases, it’s going to take you at least couple of years to reach C1 in a foreign language. It does depend on the language, and your own language background. But if you’ve reached a solid C1 in two years, you’ve done really well. And it may well take a lot longer 

C2 | Mastery

At long last, you know about 16,000 words and crying in the bathroom is ancient history! Yep – you’re a master. So we could say you’re as close as you can get to native speaker level, but not quite “native”. 

Truthfully, even at C2, natives will still be able to tell that you’re a foreigner, due to little clues here and there, most likely in your accent, but also in the occasional choice of word or the grammatical slip – it’s only tiny things that give you away. 

You’re very confident in the language now and have great control, which means you understand almost everything – even complex, technical things that you read.

When you talk to people, you can express yourself with the exact words you mean, even if it’s complicated. And you don’t even have to think about it – it feels totally natural.

Even if you want to be really subtle, you know how to do that, and you can work out a good argument if you disagree with someone.

In fact, if you do get stuck on something, you can talk around it so smoothly that other people don’t notice your mistake.

So to a native speaker listening to you, you sound intelligent and educated when you speak their language. 

Now in case that sounds like a tall order, it is! In fact, many native speakers wouldn't test in at C2 because not everyone in society is educated, is a good writer or able to sustain a serious argument or discussion.

So to reach C2 really is an incredible achievement.

And let’s not forget another pretty awesome thing – switching off those movie subtitles for good! You can easily watch any movie you want, watch the news, read complicated books and literature, write about any subject and pretty much live in the language.

And surprise surprise, reaching C2 level takes years.

How Long To Reach Different Levels Of Language Proficiency?

In fact, a handy rule of thumb for progressing through the levels is that each level takes twice as long as the previous level to reach.

So, for example…

Going at a very fast pace of intensive study, you might expect it to take…

• A1 – 1 month
• A2 – 2 months
• B1 – 4 months
• B2 – 8 months
• C1 – 16 months
• C2 – 32 months

Or just over 5 years to reach C2 in a new language at the absolute fastest.

Likely double that if you’re an English speaker learning a very distant language like Mandarin or Korean, for example. 

Check out this post on how long does it take to learn a language? if you're curious about timing.

Long time? Yeah.

But as long as you’re enjoying the journey, who cares how long it takes?

FAQs About Levels Of Language Learning

Final Thoughts On Language Levels

So there you have it – that was a brief but detailed guide to language levels according to the Common European Framework of Reference (CEFR). So now you should know which language levels applies to you.

By the way, if you want to reach the holy grail of language proficiency levels, i.e B2 level, my StoryLearning courses will help you do just that, thanks to stories, not rules. Click here for a free 7-day trial of method.

Olly Richards

Creator of the StoryLearning® Method

Olly Richards is a renowned polyglot and language learning expert with over 15 years of experience teaching millions through his innovative StoryLearning® method. He is the creator of StoryLearning, one of the world's largest language learning blogs with 500,000+ monthly readers.

Olly has authored 30+ language learning books and courses, including the bestselling "Short Stories" series published by Teach Yourself.

When not developing new teaching methods, Richards practices what he preaches—he speaks 8 languages fluently and continues learning new ones through his own methodology.