TOEFL reading tips for high score felt super generic when I first searched, but one thing actually changed my score: stop reading every passage like it’s a novel.
What helped me most:
- Read for structure, not every detail. I looked for the main idea of each paragraph and mentally labeled it.
- Do vocab in context. Don’t guess from one word only; read the sentence before and after.
- For inference questions, pick the answer that is supported, not the one that is just “possible.”
- Skip and return. If a question eats more than a minute, mark it and move on.
- Review wrong answers carefully. Most of mine were from choosing answers that sounded academic but weren’t actually in the text.
A small habit that helped a lot: after each paragraph, I paused for 2 seconds and asked, why is this paragraph here? That made summary questions way easier.