DELF in Singapore: sessions, cost and how to prepare

The Alliance Française de Singapour describes itself as the only accredited examination centre in Singapore for official French tests and diplomas. It runs DELF and DALF, the TEF, the professional DFP diplomas, and the DAEFLE teaching qualification.

The TCF does not appear on its exam page as of August 2026. If your file specifically asks for a TCF — some university procedures and immigration applications do — confirm with the centre before you plan around it, because the nearest alternative is in another country.

Registration goes through the centre, not through the French Ministry of Education, even though the diploma itself is issued by the Ministry.

Three sessions were published for 2026, each with a registration window that closes several weeks before the exam. The window is the real deadline; the exam date is only its consequence.

Fees are published per level, with a lower rate for members of the Alliance Française. Annual student membership is S$32.

DELF covers A1 to B2 and DALF covers C1 and C2. Both are issued by the French Ministry of Education, one diploma per level, and both are valid for life — once you hold a B2, it does not expire. The TCF is a different instrument: a placement test whose result is valid two years.

For study in France, Campus France states that foreign students are generally expected to hold B2, and that some programmes — particularly in the humanities and social sciences — require C1 or C2. The threshold is set by each institution and each programme, so the programme page is the only authority worth quoting in an application.

Every DELF level tests four skills — listening, reading, writing and speaking — each marked out of 25, for a total of 100. The pass mark is 50. But a score below 5 out of 25 in any single skill fails the whole exam, whatever the total.

That rule is the one candidates plan around badly. It means a strong reading and listening score cannot compensate for a speaking test left nearly blank, which is precisely the trade-off a self-taught candidate is tempted to make. Time spent on the four skills has to reflect the rule, not personal preference.

The Alliance Française de Singapour runs DELF Prim for children aged 8 to 12 and DELF Junior for teenagers aged 13 to 17, with the junior sessions offered at A1, A2 and B1.

The levels map to the same Common European Framework scale as the adult version; what differs is the material — the tasks are built around situations a school-age candidate recognises.

The Alliance Française de Singapour publishes its own pacing, which is a more useful planning tool than any general estimate. Terms run eight weeks, at 3 hours a week (regular) or 4 hours a week (semi-intensive). The A2 programme is announced as 4 or 6 terms, B1 as 6 or 8, B2 as 6 or 8, and C1/C2 as 10 or 16.

Read cumulatively, that puts B2 well beyond 500 hours of class time — before any homework. It also means that a session decided three months out is realistic for the level you already hold, and rarely for the one above.

Registration is local and fixed: one centre, three windows a year. Preparation is not. Nothing in the exam rules ties a candidate to the school where the exam is held, and the two decisions are usually made together only out of habit.

Our lessons are individual and by video, with teachers based in France. The time difference works in Singapore's favour: an evening slot locally falls in the early afternoon in France, so the hours are not the ones every local student is competing for.

Whatever the format, two things are worth checking before paying: that mock papers are sat under timed conditions and marked against the official assessment grids, and that speaking is rehearsed weekly — because of the 5-out-of-25 rule, not because it is pleasant.