TCF Canada explained: format, scoring, and CLB/NCLC conversion

The TCF Canada (Test de connaissance du français pour le Canada) is one of the two French tests accepted by IRCC for Express Entry, permanent residence, and citizenship. It's run by France Éducation international and tests all four skills in a single session. Here's the complete picture of what you'll face and how it's scored.

The four épreuves

• •Compréhension orale (listening): 39 multiple-choice questions in about 35 minutes. Every audio plays once — announcements, dialogues, radio extracts — and difficulty rises steadily from A1 to C2.
• •Compréhension écrite (reading): 39 multiple-choice questions in 60 minutes, from short notices and emails up to dense articles, also in rising difficulty.
• •Expression écrite (writing): 3 tâches in 60 minutes total — a short message (60–120 words), an article or blog post (~120–150 words), and a synthesis of two opposing documents plus your opinion (120–180 words).
• •Expression orale (speaking): 3 tâches in about 12 minutes with an examiner — a guided interview (2 min, no prep), an interaction where YOU ask the questions (2 min prep + 3 min 30), and a point of view you defend for 4 min 30 (no prep).

How scoring works

Listening and reading are reported on a 0–699 scale (the scale also maps to CEFR levels: 300s ≈ B1, 400s ≈ B2, 500s ≈ C1). Writing and speaking are marked by human examiners on a 0–20 scale.

For immigration, what matters is the NCLC conversion per skill. The key IRCC thresholds: NCLC 7 requires 453 in reading, 458 in listening, and 10/20 in both writing and speaking. NCLC 9 requires 524 / 523 / 14 / 14. NCLC 10 starts at 549 / 549 / 16 / 16. Your weakest skill sets your usable level.

What Express Entry actually rewards

French as a second official language can add up to 50 CRS points at NCLC 7+, and strong French profiles have received category-based draws with much lower CRS cutoffs. That's why NCLC 7 in all four skills is the standard target — and why the winning strategy is to fix your weakest skill, not to over-train your strongest one.