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How fast do you read a CLAT passage?
CLAT is a reading test: four of its five sections are built on passages of about 450 words. Read one 437-word passage on a timer, answer four questions on it, and see your speed, your accuracy and how both compare with the Consortium’s own guide.
Read, then answer
Step 1 of 3
Read one passage at your exam pace
The passage is 437 words, about the length of a CLAT passage. Read it the way you would in the exam: carefully enough to answer questions on it. When you have finished, press Done reading.
Then the passage goes away and you answer four questions on it. Your score is your reading speed, adjusted for how many you got right.
What the Consortium expects
The Consortium of National Law Universities describes the English Language section of UG-CLAT this way: you will be provided passages of about 450 words each … of a standard that a 12th standard student may be able to read in about 5-7 minutes.
The Current Affairs, Legal Reasoning and Logical Reasoning sections are also built on passages of up to about 450 words.
That guide, five to seven minutes for 450 words, is roughly 65 to 90 words a minute read with full understanding. It is the yardstick this test uses. The paper itself has 120 questions in 120 minutes, so the time a passage takes to read comes out of the same minutes as its questions.
Source: UG-CLAT syllabus, Consortium of NLUs (read 10 October 2026).
About the test
What is a good reading speed for CLAT?
The Consortium of NLUs says UG-CLAT passages are about 450 words and pitched so that a Class 12 student can read one in about 5–7 minutes, which works out to roughly 65–90 words a minute with full understanding. The paper has 120 questions in 120 minutes, so reading faster than that guide, without losing accuracy, leaves more time for the questions.
What is the CLAT-effective speed?
Your words per minute multiplied by the share of questions you answered correctly. Reading at 200 words a minute and getting two of four right gives an effective speed of 100. It stops skimming from looking like a strength.
Why does the passage disappear before the questions?
So that the questions test what you took in while reading. In the exam you can look back at the passage, but if you have to reread it to answer, your real reading time is longer than the timer showed.
Is anything I enter saved?
No. The timer and the scoring run in your browser and nothing is sent anywhere.
How do I get faster?
Read one passage a day against a timer and check yourself with questions straight after, as this test does. Speed that comes with accuracy lasts; speed from skipping lines does not.
For more timed reading, try the free CLAT passages with answers or the 30-minute diagnostic.
