Chinese · Higher Chinese · English
O-Level oral, listening and written exam dates
If you came here for the 2027 oral date: it does not exist yet. SEAB has not published the 2027 examination timetable, and nobody else has it either. What SEAB has published is the shape of the year, which is below, quoted. The 2026 dates — the last O-Level year — are below that, taken from the timetable itself.
There is nothing to practise on here yet.
What you can read today is the exam itself — the format, the marks and the published band descriptors, taken from the syllabus and cited. Practice is being built and will be here in time for the 2027 orals. This page will say so the day it opens, and not before.
When is the 2027 oral exam?
Not published. SEAB has released the 2027 syllabuses but not the 2027 timetable, so there is no oral date for Chinese, Higher Chinese or English — not an approximate one, and not one that can be worked out from last year. Any specific 2027 date quoted anywhere today was guessed.
What SEAB has said about the 2027 examination year, in its own words:
- “The written examinations for English Language and Mother Tongue Languages (MTL) will be held in September each year.”
- “There will only be one written examination sitting each year for all MTL subject levels (i.e. G1, G2, G3 MTL and G3 Higher MTL).”
- “The written examinations for the rest of the subjects will be held from October to November”
- “Non-written examinations such as Science practical, oral, and listening comprehension will be scheduled before the written examinations, as per current practice.”
- “The SEC examination results will be released in January of the following year”
The fourth of those is the one that matters here, and it is the closest thing to a published statement about 2027 oral timing that exists: the oral is sat before the written papers, as it always has been. With English and Mother Tongue written papers in September, that places the orals earlier in the year — but SEAB has not said how much earlier, so neither will this page.
One change worth knowing, because it is a genuine change rather than a rename: SEAB states there will be one written sitting each year for every Mother Tongue level. The 2026 timetable listed Chinese written papers on two separate dates. From 2027 there is one.
Quoted from SEAB’s Secondary Education Certificate page, seab.gov.sg, read 13 September 2026.
When will this page have the 2027 dates?
Within 24 hours of SEAB publishing the timetable. Until then this page carries no 2027 date at all, which is a deliberate choice rather than an oversight.
The alternative — publishing “expected mid-July 2027” and quietly correcting it later — is how a family ends up planning a holiday around a date somebody invented. We check monthly until the timetable appears: monthly until the 2027 sec timetable is published.
When were the 2026 oral exams?
13–17 July 2026. Chinese, Higher Chinese and English orals all ran across the same five days. A candidate sits one of them — the school assigns which, and the timetable does not say.
| Subject | Paper | Date | Duration |
|---|---|---|---|
| Chinese 1160 | 03 Oral | 13–17 July 2026 | 00:15 |
| Higher Chinese 1116 | 03 Oral | 13–17 July 2026 | 00:15 |
| English Language 1184 | 04 Oral | 13–17 July 2026 | 00:20 |
The timetable’s own remark on every oral row: “The examination is conducted in shifts. Candidates will take turns to be examined on the day of examination.”
So the honest answer to “what time is my child’s oral?” is that the national timetable does not contain it. The school does. Sessions run in morning and afternoon shifts across those days, and candidates within a shift take turns — which is also why a candidate can be scheduled to wait a long time after arriving.
Note what this rules out. Because all three subjects run across the same five days, a student taking both Chinese and Higher Chinese, or Chinese and English, sits more than one oral inside that week — very possibly on the same day, one in each shift.
The rest of the 2026 dates
Listening comprehension and the written papers, for the same three subjects, as the timetable prints them.
| Subject | Paper | Date | Duration |
|---|---|---|---|
| Chinese 1160 | 03 Listening comprehension | 7 July 2026 | 00:30 |
| English Language 1184 | 03 Listening comprehension | 15 October 2026 | 00:45 |
| Chinese 1160 | 01 Written | 2 June 2026 and 3 November 2026 | 02:00 |
| Chinese 1160 | 02 Written | 2 June 2026 and 3 November 2026 | 01:30 |
| Higher Chinese 1116 | 01 Written | 3 November 2026 | 02:00 |
| Higher Chinese 1116 | 02 Written | 3 November 2026 | 01:45 |
| English Language 1184 | 01 Written | 19 October 2026 | 01:50 |
| English Language 1184 | 02 Written | 19 October 2026 | 01:50 |
Chinese Paper 1 and Paper 2 appear on two dates — 2 June 2026 and 3 November 2026 — with the same durations and no remark distinguishing them. SEAB’s timetable gives no reason, so this page does not offer one. If it matters to your child, the school knows which sitting they are entered for.
All 2026 dates from the archived 2026 Singapore-Cambridge GCE O-Level Examination Timetable (Updated as at 13 February 2026).
When do the results come out?
For the 2026 cohort, MOE gives it as tentative: 13 to 15 January 2027. Under the SEC, SEAB states results are released in January of the following year.
The word tentative is MOE’s, and it is carried here on purpose. A results date presented as settled is exactly the sort of small confidence a family plans around and then resents.
Common questions
- When is the 2027 O-Level / SEC Chinese oral exam?
- SEAB has not published the 2027 examination timetable, so there is no date to give — and any specific 2027 oral date published anywhere today is not yet knowable. SEAB has said that non-written examinations including the oral are scheduled before the written papers, and that English and Mother Tongue written papers sit in September. This page will carry the dates within 24 hours of SEAB publishing them.
- When were the 2026 O-Level oral exams?
- 13–17 July 2026. Chinese (1160), Higher Chinese (1116) and English (1184) orals all ran across those same five days. A candidate sits one of them; the school assigns which, and the timetable does not say.
- What time is the oral exam?
- The timetable does not give a candidate a time. Its remark on every oral row reads: "The examination is conducted in shifts. Candidates will take turns to be examined on the day of examination." Sessions are listed as starting in the morning or the afternoon, and the school tells the candidate which shift they are in.
- Why is the 2026 Chinese written paper listed on two dates?
- SEAB's 2026 timetable lists Chinese Paper 1 and Paper 2 on both 2 June and 3 November, with the same durations and no remark distinguishing them, and it gives no reason. We are not going to guess at one. Under the SEC from 2027 SEAB states there will be only one written sitting each year for all Mother Tongue levels.
- When are the 2026 O-Level results released?
- MOE gives it as tentative: 13 to 15 January 2027. Under the SEC, results are released in January of the following year.
Last checked against the SEAB syllabus documents on 13 September 2026. This page was updated on 2026-09-13. OralPrep is not affiliated with SEAB or MOE.