Learn English for a specific goal

What counts as good English depends entirely on what you need it for. The vocabulary that gets you through a technical interview is close to useless at passport control, and exam English rewards a precision that would make you sound strange at dinner. Each goal below is a route through the same material, ordered by what that goal actually asks of you first.

Goals

• Everyday conversation64 articlesThe English of ordinary days: small talk, plans, opinions, the phone call you have been putting off. Broad rather than specialised, and the fastest route to feeling like you can hold your own.
• Business English52 articlesMeetings, email, negotiation and the register they run on. Much of it is tone rather than vocabulary — the difference between a request that lands and one that reads as a demand.
• IT interviews23 articlesTalking about your own work under pressure: describing architecture, defending a technical decision, explaining what went wrong on a project. Starts above beginner level, because the subject matter does.
• School75 articlesThe English the classroom asks for — the grammar on the syllabus, written accuracy, and the kind of question that turns up in homework and end-of-term tests.
• Exam preparation66 articlesIELTS, TOEFL and school-leaving exams reward things ordinary English does not: fixed formats, timed writing, and a precision that is graded rather than merely appreciated.
• Travel27 articlesAirports, hotels, directions, ordering, and going wrong in a foreign city and asking for help. Narrow, immediately useful, and workable at a lower level than any other goal here.

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