AHPRA OET requirements: pharmacy, dental and allied health

The shared standard and the exception

Ahpra states that all National Boards except the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health Practice Board accept the same English tests and minimum scores. The professions grouped here use that shared standard. For sittings from 23 April 2026, the OET component lines are Listening 350, Reading 360, Writing 350 and Speaking 360. Older sittings and sittings across the transition need the dated rules on Ahpra’s page.

The standard permits a maximum of two complete sittings within twelve months, with component floors in each: Listening 320, Reading 340, Writing 350 and Speaking 350. Results normally remain valid for two years before lodging; specific maintained-work or study circumstances may allow older results. Centre-based paper and computer tests are accepted, including the permitted remote element of the venue computer test; the full OET@Home product is excluded. Where OET has no dedicated test for a registered profession, Ahpra permits another profession-specific OET meeting its standard.

Receiving-body source · Checked 30 Oct 2026.

Identify which organisation is making which decision

A pharmacist, dentist or allied health professional may encounter an assessment organisation, a National Board and an immigration authority during the move to Australia. Keep a separate evidence record for each receiving organisation. This page addresses the Ahpra registration English standard. It does not establish the English requirement for an assessment examination, a university place, an employer or a visa claim.

For an application question, give the recipient your profession, route, test date, delivery format and complete component result. Ask which published rule applies and retain the answer. If an assessing body uses a different test rule, record it beside the registration requirement rather than replacing either one. This prevents a result accepted for an earlier stage from being assumed acceptable for every subsequent stage. Only rely on a waiver or exception once the body making that decision has confirmed it for your circumstances.

OETAce study and application-planning suggestions; no additional registration conditions.

Use the task for the professional work you actually do

For Pharmacy, practise reporting medicine-use difficulties and the reason a prescriber needs to review them. For Dentistry, make the complaint, findings and requested dental care easy to locate. In Physiotherapy and Occupational Therapy, show how function affects the proposed plan, including home or work information only where it changes the reader’s decision. Those choices matter more than copying every case note into polished sentences.

For Medical Radiation, explain the purpose and preparation of an investigation using the information in the task. For Podiatry, connect current foot problems and relevant risk factors with follow-up. For Optometry, distinguish symptoms reported by the patient from observations recorded during examination. Open the matching professional practice link below, then select the intended reader before drafting. These are original practice activities, not board-approved assessments or clinical instructions.

OETAce study and application-planning suggestions; no additional registration conditions.

Plan around the components that still need work

Copy your real test result into a study record in Listening, Reading, Writing and Speaking order. Compare it with the rule for the date of that sitting. When considering another test, keep both complete statements in view and check the floor in each component of each sitting. Do not focus only on the strongest score you can assemble across the statements. A component that misses a floor can make that combination unusable.

For study, choose a particular communication problem to improve. In writing, this might be an unclear request or background that obscures the reason for referral. In speaking, it might be explaining the plan before asking about the patient’s concern. Practise the change, review the evidence in your feedback and try it in another original case. Keep practice estimates labelled as practice so that they are never submitted as test results. The profession links lead to the existing free entry; practice passes provide continued use under the listed allowances. They do not provide a registration guarantee.

OETAce study and application-planning suggestions; no additional registration conditions.

Practise for your profession

Use original cases to select notes, write and revise, or rehearse a conversation with an AI patient or client. Marking uses the existing practice allowance; continued access is available through our practice passes.

• Pharmacy Writing · Speaking
• Dentistry Writing · Speaking
• Physiotherapy Writing · Speaking
• Occupational therapy Writing · Speaking
• Radiography Writing · Speaking
• Podiatry Writing · Speaking
• Optometry Writing · Speaking

View practice passes · Compare receiving bodies and download the CSV

OETAce is an independent practice platform, not affiliated with OET or any receiving body named on this page. Practice feedback is not a registration decision.