A1, B2, C1: the letters are on every language school's price list, every job posting that asks for English, and every visa checklist. Yet most learners could not say what the letters actually promise, which makes it very easy to sell them the wrong course. Here is the system in plain terms, with the published numbers attached.
What the CEFR is
The Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR) is a shared scale for describing what a learner can do in a language, from A1 (beginner) to C2 (mastery). It is the scale employers, universities and visa officers recognise, and the big exams, IELTS and TOEFL among them, publish alignments to it. Its levels are defined by capability, not by vocabulary lists: the question is never how many words you know, but what you can get done.
The six levels, honestly described
| Level | What you can actually do | Published guided-learning hours from zero |
|---|---|---|
| A1 | Introduce yourself, handle everyday phrases, fill in basic forms | 60 to 80 |
| A2 | Hold routine exchanges, describe your background and needs simply | 160 to 200 |
| B1 | Handle travel, work and study situations, write connected text | 350 to 400 |
| B2 | Argue a position, work in English, follow technical discussion | 500 to 600 |
| C1 | Fluent and flexible in academic and professional settings | 700 to 800 |
The hours are guided-learning estimates: classroom instruction plus structured study, counted from zero. C2 exists above all of this, but it is a specialist's level and most learners never need it. B2 is where most of the doors people actually care about, university admission abroad, working in English, start opening.
The arithmetic nobody advertises
Look at the gaps between the rows: roughly 150 to 200 hours of guided learning separate each level from the next. That one number lets you audit any promise a language school makes.
Take a standard rhythm of 3 hours of class per week. A 10-week term is 30 hours. Against a 150-to-200-hour gap, one term moves you about half a level. That is the honest claim: half a level per term, a full level in roughly a year of steady classes. When an advert offers fluent in three months, the arithmetic has to hide somewhere, usually in the definition of fluent.
Children move slower per hour, not faster. A child needs more repetition per hour of class than an adult, so a school year of around 90 hours honestly buys about one full level for a young learner. Any faster promise is setting the family up for disappointment in June.
Which level do you actually need?
- School support: A1 and A2 are where children build the base that classroom English quietly assumes.
- The BAC and university: B1 to B2. Universities teaching in English typically ask for B2.
- Working in English: B2 for everyday professional work; C1 where the work itself is language-heavy: meetings, negotiation, writing for clients.
- IELTS and TOEFL: the exams measure across the scale, but exam preparation only makes sense from B1 upward. Below that, general English first is both faster and cheaper.
Why levels are split into halves
Because 150 to 200 hours is too big to sell or to teach as one unit, serious schools split each level in two: B1.1 and B1.2, each a term of about 30 hours. This is not marketing subdivision, it matches how the hours actually add up, and it gives a learner a real, reachable milestone every ten weeks rather than a distant one every year.
Three mistakes that waste money
- Paying for a year upfront. Levels are checkpoints. Buy a term, sit the end-of-term assessment, then decide again. A school confident in its teaching has no reason to demand a year.
- Skipping the placement test. Guessing your level wrong costs a full term either way: bored in a class below you, or lost in one above you.
- Chasing C1 when the goal needs B2. Check what the university, employer or exam actually asks for before buying the extra 200 hours. The most expensive level is the one you did not need.
How to find your level
Not by feel: learners routinely underrate their reading and overrate their speaking, or the reverse. A placement test that checks grammar, vocabulary, reading and a short piece of writing places you far more accurately, and it stops you paying for a term you have already passed or drowning in one you are not ready for. Ours is free and takes about 30 minutes; some schools in town charge 100 MAD for theirs.
One last honest note. Hours in class are the measurable part, and the estimates above assume the rest: homework attempted, mistakes made out loud, English met somewhere outside the classroom. A learner who only ever touches the language for 3 hours a week inside a classroom will sit at the slow end of every range on that table. The framework measures what you can do, and doing, in the end, is what moves the letter.