Most candidates prepare hard for the French and not at all for the day itself. Then something small goes wrong. They bring the wrong ID, or the name on the passport doesn’t match the registration, or they discover the audio starts the moment they click begin.
One rule has changed recently, and it’s the one that ends exams before they start. Alliance Française de Delhi states that from January 2026, a valid passport is required at registration; it must remain valid on the exam date, and only a passport is accepted. Other photo IDs do not qualify. No Aadhaar, no PAN card, no driving license.
I’ve been teaching French for over fifteen years, and I’ve watched capable students lose a seat over paperwork rather than French. So before you book anything, check your passport expiry against current TEF and TCF test centers in India. If you’d rather someone walk you through the whole process, our TEF Canada preparation course includes a booking and readiness checklist.
What Do You Need to Bring to the TEF or TCF Canada Exam?
Bring your valid passport and a printed copy of your convocation email. That’s the whole list. Your passport must be valid on the exam date, not only on the day you registered. Without a valid ID, entry is denied. Phones, bags, notes, and smartwatches go into storage before you enter the room.
Four details people get wrong, in the order they cause trouble:
- The name on your passport must match your registration exactly. A missing middle name or a swapped given-surname order causes real problems at the desk. Indian passports often print names differently from how we write them day-to-day. Check the match when you register, not on exam morning.
- Print the convocation email. Don’t plan to show it on your phone, because phones go into storage before you reach the desk.
- Passport validity is checked against the exam date. A passport expiring three weeks after you register but before you sit is not acceptable.
- Arrive early. Sessions are assigned to fixed slots, and latecomers are not accommodated.
If your passport is being renewed, do not book until it’s back in your hands. A renewal receipt is not an ID.
How Does Booking Actually Work in India, and Why Do Seats Run Out?
Seats are limited and allocated on a first-come, first-served basis. Alliance Française Delhi lists 22 seats per exam date for TCF Canada at ₹26,000 including GST. A seat is confirmed only after successful payment, and no refunds are issued except when the exam itself is canceled.
That scarcity is the part candidates underestimate. Most people assume they can book a month before their Express Entry deadline. Often they can’t because the date falls within the week the window opened.
Two habits fix this. Watch for the registration window opening rather than checking casually every few weeks. And have your payment method ready and working before you start the form, because a failed transaction while seats are moving is how people end up on a waiting list.
Centers also differ by exam. TCF Canada sessions run in a smaller set of cities than TEF Canada, so the exam you choose can decide how far you travel. If you’re new to the process, our step-by-step TEF Canada registration guide for India covers the sequence from account creation to payment.
If you have to travel to another city
Travel the day before. Not the morning of. A delayed flight or a canceled train turns a ₹26,000 non-refundable fee into nothing, and there’s no goodwill rebooking for missed sessions.
Book accommodation within reasonable reach of the center and check the actual address on your convocation, since some centers run exams at a different venue from their main office.
Read our guide to: Is NCLC 9 worth it? and recent TEF and TCF Canada topics.
What Happens in the Hour Before the Exam Starts?
You’ll show your passport and printed convocation, have your photograph taken on site, store your belongings, and be seated at an assigned computer. Staff will check your headphones and ask you to set the volume before anything begins. Then the written papers run in a fixed order, with no breaks that you choose.
Set your headphone volume properly during the check. It sounds trivial. It isn’t. Once the listening audio starts, the paper runs on its own clock, and you can’t pause it to fix your sound. Ask for a different headset during the check if anything sounds muffled or one-sided. Nobody minds at that point. Everybody minds ten minutes later.
Use the waiting time to settle rather than revise. Reading vocabulary lists in the last twenty minutes doesn’t add anything, and it raises your heart rate at exactly the wrong moment. If you want something to do, quietly run through your speaking openers in your head.
What Does the Computer-Based Exam Screen Look Like?
Both exams are computer-based at the center. You’ll see one question at a time, with the text or audio player above, the answer options below, a question counter, and a timer. Reading lets you move back and forth between questions. Listening does not wait for you; the audio sets the pace.
That difference changes how you work.
In reading, you can flag a question and return to it. Use that. A question you’re stuck on at minute ten is often obvious at minute forty, once you’ve read more of the paper and settled.
In listening, there is no going back to reclaim a question once the audio has moved on. If you miss one, let it go immediately. The single most expensive listening mistake is spending the next question thinking about the last one, which turns one lost mark into three.
Scratch paper rules vary by center. Ask at the desk what you’re allowed to write on and whether it’s collected. Don’t assume you can take notes on your convocation printout.
How Long Is the Exam Day, Paper by Paper?
Expect most of the day. The written papers run back-to-back, and the speaking test is scheduled separately, sometimes the same day and sometimes not. All four tests must be completed for your certificate to be recognized by Canadian authorities.
| Paper | TEF Canada | TCF Canada |
|---|---|---|
| Listening | 40 questions, 40 minutes | 39 questions, 35 minutes |
| Reading | 40 questions, 1 hour | 39 questions, 60 minutes |
| Writing | 2 sections, 60 minutes | 3 tasks, 60 minutes |
| Speaking | 2 sections, about 15 minutes | 3 tasks, about 12 minutes |
The TEF figures come from the exam board’s examination page. If a website says TEF reading has 50 questions or listening has 60, it hasn’t been updated since December 2023, when both papers were reduced to 40 questions.
Eat properly before you go, and eat something that lasts. Four papers of concentrated French are genuinely tiring, and the fade shows up in the final paper more than anywhere else. Candidates lose marks at the end of the day that they would never lose at the start.
What Actually Happens in the Speaking Test?
You sit with a real examiner, not a computer, and the session is recorded. The examiner plays a role and stays in it. For TEF Canada, it’s two sections in about 15 minutes. For TCF Canada, there are three tasks in about 12 minutes, with a short preparation window only before the second task.
A few things surprise people.
The recording. It shouldn’t change anything, but candidates who notice the microphone mid-answer often freeze. Expect it, and it fades into the background.
The examiner’s flat delivery. They’re not being cold. They’re being consistent across every candidate that day. Don’t read their face for feedback, because there isn’t any to read.
The pace. In TEF Section A, you’re asking the questions, which reverses the dynamic candidates rehearse for. If you go quiet, the examiner will wait rather than rescue you.
One correction is worth making because it circulates widely and does real damage. In TEF Canada, Section B lasts about ten minutes. Those ten minutes are the length of the task, not preparation time. You do not get ten minutes to plan. Candidates who believe otherwise arrive expecting a planning window that never comes.
What If Something Goes Wrong During the Exam?
Raise your hand and let the invigilator deal with it. If your machine freezes, the audio fails, or the headset cuts out, stop and signal immediately rather than trying to fix it yourself. Invigilators can log the fault, and a logged fault is the only thing that supports a later request for a remedy.
The same applies if you fall ill during the session. Tell someone at the time. A complaint raised days later, with nothing recorded on the day, rarely goes anywhere.
If you miss the exam entirely, assume the fee is gone. Refunds are limited to cancellations by the center. That’s harsh, and it’s why the travel-the-day-before rule matters so much.
What Happens After the Exam?
Results arrive within a few weeks and are valid for two years. They must be valid both when you submit your Express Entry profile and when you’re invited to apply, which is the timing detail that catches candidates who test too early in the process.
When the certificate arrives, check every section against what you expected. If one paper is far below the others, resist the urge to rebook immediately. Work out which paper actually pulled the score down and why, because retaking without changing anything usually reproduces the same result. Our guide to entering results in the IRCC portal covers what to do with the certificate once you have it.
Keep the original certificate and a scan of it. You’ll need the reference details when you fill in your profile, and chasing a replacement takes longer than the two minutes it takes to file it properly now.
The Exam-Day Mistakes I See Most Often
None of these are about French. All of them cost marks or seats.
- Booking a date close to a profile deadline, then finding the session full
- Turning up with a photo ID that isn’t a passport
- Accepting a headset that sounds slightly wrong during the check
- Chasing a missed listening question into the next three
- Skipping breakfast and fading in the final paper
- Arriving on the morning flight
- Treating the examiner’s neutral face as bad news
Every one of them is preventable the week before, which is the point of reading this page now rather than the night before.
Walk In Knowing What to Expect
Three things to take away. From January 2026, a valid passport is the only accepted ID, and it must be valid on the exam date. Seats are limited and non-refundable, so book when the window opens rather than when your deadline approaches. And there’s no IRCC-accepted at-home version of either exam, so plan the travel properly.
If you’re preparing in the NCR, come and see us. Our French courses in Noida run in batches of 6 to 10 students, so everyone gets speaking time in every session and regular individual feedback. If you’re outside Delhi NCR, our online French classes run live across India and abroad in the same small batches.
Call or WhatsApp us with your test date, and we’ll tell you honestly whether you’re ready for it, or visit the center and sit in on a class before you decide.
