Sample answers · Reading FIB (drag-and-drop)
PTE Reading: Fill in the Blanks · Reading section
PTE Reading FIB sample: Band 79 drag-and-drop picks.
A worked Reading FIB item: a 74-word passage on the Great Australian Bight with 5 drag-and-drop blanks, all 9 word-bank items analysed (which blank each maps to, or why it's an unused distractor), the Band 79 filled version, and the partial-credit scoring math. No negative marking – always fill every blank.
Last verified 17 July 2026 · Written for PTE Academic post-August 2025 format · Verified against Pearson's July 2025 Score Guide.
The passage
74 words · inside Pearson's ≤80 word limit for Reading FIB · 5 drag-and-drop blanks from a shared 9-word bank.
The Great Australian Bight, a vast1of coastline stretching from Western Australia to South Australia, contains one of the world's highest2of endemic marine species. Because deep, cold currents3the region for much of the year, marine life here has evolved in relative isolation. Recent surveys have4over eighty species new to science in a single expedition, with most concentrated on the underwater canyons at the edge of the continental5.
On the real exam each blank is an empty drop target that accepts a dragged word from the bank shown below.
Word bank (drag from here)
9 words total: 5 will be dropped into blanks, 4 are unused distractors. Bank words cannot be re-used across blanks.
The task instruction
The verbatim Pearson task instruction shown before every Reading FIB item.
Per-bank-word analysis
All 9 bank words analysed against the passage.
Every distractor is grammatically plausible somewhere in the passage. What separates a correct pick from a trap is a two-check test: does the word's meaning fit the paragraph, and does it collocate naturally with the words immediately around the blank?
Why: "A vast stretch of coastline" is the standard geography-writing collocation for an extended piece of coast. Grammatically a noun after "a vast", semantically the length of a coastal region.
Why: Plausible for blank 1 ("a vast distance of coastline") but "distance" implies a measurement between two points, not the coastal extent itself. Wrong collocation. Unused distractor.
Why: "Highest concentrations of endemic marine species" is the exact biogeography collocation, meaning densities of a species in a given area. Countable noun, matches "highest".
Why: Plausible for blank 2, but "amounts" is used with uncountable nouns. Species is countable, so "numbers" or "concentrations" wins. Grammatical trap for readers who don't check countability.
Why: "Deep, cold currents dominate the region" is the standard ecology-writing verb for describing environmental forces that shape a habitat. Present tense, plural subject – agreement is correct.
Why: Grammatical and semantically related, but "influence" is weaker than "dominate". The passage's logic (marine life has evolved in relative isolation) needs the stronger verb – cold currents don't just influence the region, they define it.
Why: "Have documented over eighty species" is the precise scientific-survey verb for formally recording new species with evidence. Fits the passage's academic register.
Why: Grammatical but too shallow. "Counted over eighty species" implies numerical enumeration only, while the passage's context is species new to science, which requires formal identification and description, not just tallying.
Why: "The edge of the continental shelf" is a specific marine-geology term for the underwater plateau at the continent's margin, where the canyons the passage mentions actually sit.
Band 79 answer
The 5 drops that earn full marks.
Passage with correct bank words dropped in
The Great Australian Bight, a vaststretchof coastline stretching from Western Australia to South Australia, contains one of the world's highestconcentrationsof endemic marine species. Because deep, cold currentsdominatethe region for much of the year, marine life here has evolved in relative isolation. Recent surveys havedocumentedover eighty species new to science in a single expedition, with most concentrated on the underwater canyons at the edge of the continentalshelf.
5 correct drops, 0 wrong. Raw score: +5. 5/5 – full marks.
Scoring math (why guessing is always net-positive)
Reading FIB has NO negative marking. Wrong drops never subtract.
| Strategy | Drops | Raw math | Score |
|---|---|---|---|
| Band 79 pick (all 5 blanks correct) | 5 correct, 0 wrong | +5 | 5/5 – full marks |
| One near-synonym swap ('influence' for blank 3) | 4 correct, 1 wrong | +4 | 4/5 – no penalty for the wrong word |
| Two countability slips ('amounts' for 2, 'distance' for 1) | 3 correct, 2 wrong | +3 | 3/5 |
| Left blank 5 empty (unsure of geology term) | 4 correct, 1 empty | +4 | 4/5 – SAME as guessing. Always drop SOMETHING into every blank. |
| Panic-drops (all 5 wrong) | 0 correct, 5 wrong | 0 | 0/5 – no penalty, just zero. Wrong drops never subtract. |
The rule: +1 per correct drop, 0 per wrong or empty blank. Minimum score is 0. Wrong drops never subtract, so dropping your best-guess bank word into every blank is strictly better than leaving any blank empty.
The Band 79 drag-and-drop strategy
6 steps to hit 5/5 without losing the section clock.
Read the whole passage first with the blanks in place
The passage is only ~70 to 80 words but the meaning is dense. Read it twice at natural pace before touching the word bank. The bank should reinforce your reading, not replace it.
Scan the word bank for obvious pairs
Some blanks pair cleanly with a single bank word by part of speech and topic – "continental shelf" is the only geology-plausible pair in this bank. Lock those in first. It frees your attention for the ambiguous blanks.
For each remaining blank, check part of speech AND collocation
Bank words are chosen so 2 to 3 fit each blank grammatically. The extra filter is collocation: "amounts of species" is wrong because species is countable; "stretch of coastline" is right because it's the fixed phrase.
Check countability, tense and subject-verb agreement
Blank 3 needs a plural verb ("currents dominate", not "currents dominates"). Blank 2 needs a countable noun ("concentrations" not "amounts"). Small grammar checks eliminate half the trap options.
Fill every blank even if uncertain
Reading FIB has no negative marking. A wrong drop scores 0, an empty blank scores 0, and a right drop scores +1. The only losing move is leaving a blank empty when there's still a plausible bank word available.
Budget 60 to 90 seconds per RFIB item
Passages are short (~80 words) and there are 4 to 5 items on the test, so RFIB should be the fastest task type in Reading. Save the deliberation minutes for MCMA and Reorder.
5 common Reading FIB mistakes
The failure modes that drag a Band 79 to a Band 60.
| Mistake | What it costs you |
|---|---|
| Dragging words based on the sentence with the blank, not the paragraph | Bank distractors are designed to be locally plausible. "Amounts" for blank 2 reads fine in the immediate 6 words but breaks when you check countability of "species". Local reading loses to whole-passage reading. |
| Not checking part of speech before dropping | Verb-vs-noun mix-ups are the fastest way to score 0 on a blank. Every drop should pass a quick "noun / verb / adjective" check against the blank's grammatical slot. |
| Missing the countable/uncountable trap | "Amounts of species" fails because species is countable; "amounts of water" would work. RFIB distractors often exploit exactly this trap. Native readers usually spot it; non-native readers usually don't. |
| Leaving a blank empty because "none of the bank words feel right" | Empty blanks score 0. Wrong drops also score 0. There is no penalty for wrong drops on RFIB, so you should always drop your best-guess bank word into every blank. |
| Using the same bank word twice | The interface prevents it – you can't split one draggable pill across two blanks. But readers who don't notice a distractor is a distractor sometimes swap two used words in a way that leaves one blank correct and another wrong. |
FAQ
Reading Fill in the Blanks, answered.
How is PTE Reading: Fill in the Blanks (drag-and-drop) scored?
Partial credit, no negative marking. Every blank filled with the correct bank word scores +1; every wrong or empty blank scores 0. There is no penalty for wrong drops, so the correct strategy is to fill every blank even when uncertain.
How many blanks and how many bank words are there in Reading FIB?
Typically 4 to 5 blanks in a passage of up to 80 words, with a shared word bank of 8 to 10 draggable words. Some bank words are correct picks; the rest are unused distractors chosen to be grammatically valid but semantically wrong.
How many Reading FIB items are on the PTE Academic test?
4 to 5 items per test per Pearson's July 2025 Score Guide. It sits in Part 2 (Reading) alongside Reading & Writing Fill in the Blanks (dropdown), Reorder Paragraphs, Multiple Choice Multiple Answers, and Multiple Choice Single Answer.
How is Reading FIB different from Reading & Writing FIB?
Answer format and passage length. Reading FIB is drag-and-drop from a shared word bank on a passage up to 80 words. R&W FIB is per-blank dropdown (4 options each) on a passage up to 300 words. Reading FIB tests vocabulary and syntax; R&W FIB tests collocation and paragraph meaning.
Can I drag the same bank word into two blanks?
No. The interface treats each draggable pill as a single item – once you drop it into a blank, it leaves the bank. If two blanks need the same word, the item is faulty by Pearson's authoring rules and would not have shipped.
Should I always fill every blank in Reading FIB?
Yes. There is no negative marking. A wrong drop scores 0, an empty blank also scores 0, and a right drop scores +1. Dropping your best-guess bank word gives you a chance at a mark with zero downside. Never leave a blank empty.
How long should I spend on one RFIB item?
About 60 to 90 seconds. The passage is short (~80 words) and the bank is small (~10 words), so RFIB should be the fastest task in Reading. If an item is taking 3+ minutes, you're over-reading the bank – lock in your best guesses and move on.
Keep going with Reading: Fill in the Blanks
One pattern, three depths.
You've just read the band 79 worked example. Here's the rest of the loop for this task.
Reusable framework
Reading: Fill in the Blanks template
The reusable answer framework — structure, sentence starters, timing marks — that fits any Reading: Fill in the Blanks prompt.
Read the template →Interactive drill
Practise Reading: Fill in the Blanks
Free interactive drills — do the reps yourself with the model answer revealed after each attempt.
Start the drill →Further reading
Related tools.
- → Reading & Writing FIB sample – the sibling dropdown task with a longer passage.
- → Reading MCMA sample – the negative-marking Reading task where guessing is expensive.
- → Reading section overview – all 5 reading task types.
- → Take a free scored mock – real Reading FIB items with AI scoring.