Free tool · PhD planning
Viva practice
Random viva questions and a two-minute timer, for practising your answers out loud.
This tool asks you one PhD viva question at a time and gives you a two-minute timer to answer it out loud. The question comes at random from 26 questions that examiners commonly ask. Below each question you will also see what the examiner is really checking. That way you answer the purpose of the question, and not only its words.
If you already know your weak area, pick only that theme. For most scholars it is methodology. Or keep it on all themes and get a mixed round. A question will not come back till you have seen every question in the theme you chose. The tool is most useful in the last few weeks before the viva-voce. At that stage scholars know the thesis very well, but mostly they have not spoken it aloud to anybody.
Practise a viva question
Method
How this tool works
The questions are taken from the table in our guide to common PhD viva questions. They are grouped in eight themes, roughly in the order an examiner goes through a thesis. First theme is the big picture, and literature and gap follows it. Objectives and theory and then methodology come next. After these come analysis and results, findings and limitations, and at the end what the thesis contributes. Every theme has three or four questions, 26 in total.
When you press the button, the tool shuffles the questions of your chosen theme and gives them to you one by one. Once the last one is over, it shuffles again. The line under each question, “What the examiner is checking”, comes from that same table. Take a question on your sample size. Mostly it is not about the number at all. The examiner want to know whether you took that decision yourself and can defend it.
The timer counts down from two minutes. In two minutes you can make two or three points and give one example, and the examiner will still be listening to you. Long spoken answers start wandering. Many times the examiner cuts in with the next question when you are only halfway through. If you finish in thirty seconds, check once whether you gave a reason or only a statement.
Please speak every answer out loud and in complete sentences. Inside the head the answer always sounds fine to you, so you don’t notice where it is weak. When you speak it fully, you see the exact point where you get stuck. If possible, ask a colleague or your guide to read the questions to you and interrupt like an examiner might do. After these general questions start feeling easy, try the viva question predictor. It suggests questions from your own abstract.
Limits
What this tool can’t do
FAQ
Frequently asked questions
How many questions will the examiner ask?
There is no fixed number. Usually the questioning is the longest part of the viva. It can go from half an hour to well over an hour. So be ready for many questions, and also for follow-ups on the answers you give. Your university may have its own practice here. Your guide will know what is normal in your department.
How long should an answer be?
Keep most answers to one or two minutes. First say the answer directly, after that the reason. If it helps, add one piece of evidence from your own thesis, and stop there. When the examiner wants more, they will ask you. The opening “tell us about your work” question is different. For that one only, a slightly longer answer that you have planned well is worth it.
Any tips for an online viva?
Examiners ask the same questions online as in the room, only the risk of technical failure gets added. One day before, test your camera, microphone, internet and screen sharing. Keep a phone ready as backup connection and sit in a quiet room. The viva is still open to the audience, so check that the university has shared the link with everyone who may attend. UGC’s 2022 regulations allow the viva to be held online.
What if I don’t know the answer?
This happens to every scholar. The examiner watches how you deal with it, more than that one point. Take a pause and think. A short silence only looks careful. If the question is not clear to you, ask the examiner what they mean. Answer whatever part you can, and say plainly what you did not test or have not read, and stop there. Being correct is what examiners are looking for, and if you bluff once and they catch it, they start doubting your earlier good answers also. There is more on this in our viva questions guide.
Is anything recorded?
The questions run inside your browser. Your voice, your answers and the questions you saw stay on your own device. Same as every other tool on this site, we count only that the tool was used, and we keep nothing that identifies you.
Can someone help me with a proper mock viva?
Yes. The nearest practice to the real viva is a mock viva by an examiner from your field, with questions taken from your own thesis. Our viva voce preparation service does this and gives written feedback also. But every answer you will still give yourself only.
Keep reading
Related guides and services
Common PhD viva questions
The questions examiners ask most often, grouped by theme, with how to prepare each answer.
Viva Voce Preparation
Presentation review, a question bank built from your thesis, and a mock viva before the real one.
PhD thesis submission and evaluation
From submission to award: similarity check, examiners, reports, revisions and the viva.
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