How the A2 Latvian language exam works: all four parts

Published 19 September 2026.

Registering for the exam is straightforward, and we have a separate guide for that. The question people actually ask is a different one: what will happen in the room. How long it takes, what you will have to read, what you will be asked, and whether failing one part can be offset by doing well in the others.

Here is the state language proficiency test (valsts valodas prasmes pārbaude) at the A2 level, part by part. A2 is the level required for a permanent residence permit and for EU long term resident status in those cases where proof of language is required and you are not exempt.

Four skills are tested, each as a separate block: listening (klausīšanās), reading (lasīšana), writing (rakstīšana) and speaking (runāšana).

Sixty points in total. Those timings cover the tasks themselves, so you will spend longer at the test centre: add waiting for your turn, especially before the speaking part.

The order is fixed: listening and reading on a computer first, then the writing tasks on paper, then speaking one to one.

Speaking may take place over a video link, and this is worth getting right: you cannot sit the exam from home. You are in the test room with a supervisor present, and the assessors join remotely.

You listen to short everyday recordings and complete tasks as you go: matching the halves of statements, marking which statements are true, choosing one option out of several. The topics are predictable: shopping, booking a doctor, timetables, a conversation at work.

One detail removes half the anxiety: each recording is played twice. Use the first play to listen to the whole thing without reaching for your pen, and fill in the answers on the second.

You get short everyday texts: adverts, instructions, letters, fragments of web pages. The task types vary: marking which statement matches the text, matching real life situations to the right advert, choosing the right word for a gap.

Unfamiliar words may come up, and that is fine. It pays to look for the answer to a specific question rather than work through every word in order: you have half an hour for the whole section.

Three tasks, all of them short.

Nobody expects an essay. What is expected is that you can produce an everyday text to a given brief and meet the required length. Note that 30 and 35 words are minimums: a text shorter than the required length loses points no matter how well written it is.

If writing is the weak spot, what helps is working through the task formats themselves rather than studying the language in general. That is what our adult courses are built around.

Three tasks again, and the second and third usually come as a surprise.

The third task is worth practising separately. People prepare to answer and almost never prepare to ask, but here you have to build the question yourself.

At A2, simple sentences are enough. No one expects extended reasoning.

This is what most often produces an unexpected fail.

The exam is passed if you score at least 60% in each of the four skills, that is, a minimum of 9 points out of 15. The total does not save you. You can do excellently in listening, reading and speaking, score 8 in writing, and fail the whole exam.

The practical conclusion for preparation follows directly: work on your weakest part. The difference between 12 and 14 points in reading buys you nothing, while the difference between 8 and 9 in writing decides everything.

The decision is available on the Latvija.gov.lv portal from the seventh working day after the exam. A paper document sent by registered post is a separate paid service, and not everyone needs to order it.

You can retake the exam. The regulations set no limit on the number of ordinary attempts and no specific waiting period between them: you register again and pick an available date, and each attempt is paid for separately. The chronologically latest result is the one that counts.

One case is set out separately in the regulations: if you are removed from the exam for breaching the rules of conduct, your work is not assessed and the next attempt is possible no sooner than six months later.

The state fee is 52 euros, and not everyone pays it. It does not apply to Latvian citizens and non-citizens, or to citizens of the EU, the EEA and Switzerland. Separate exemptions exist for people with low income status and for Ukrainian civilians covered by the relevant support law. For more on who needs the exam at all, see our article on what level of Latvian you need.

The official test programmes for all levels are freely available in the «Pārbaudes programma» section of the VIAA website, along with the audio files for the listening section.

This is not a trainer with automatic marking, it is the programme itself: a full set of tasks in exactly the format you will get on the day. It is worth doing properly: with a timer, without a dictionary, writing the written part by hand. The point is not to find out your score but to find out which part is weakest while there is still time to do something about it.

If your Latvian is already roughly at A2 and the job is to learn the format, a few weeks is usually enough. If you are starting without the language, the timeline is a different matter entirely, and we covered it separately in our piece on how long it takes to reach A2.

In our teachers’ experience, the last month before the exam is better spent on task formats and timing than on expanding vocabulary.