Free rehearsal tool

Face the panel
before the panel.

Your viva is one room, two examiners, and three to seven years of your work on the table. Most candidates rehearse twice, politely, with friends who pull their punches.

This council examines you one hostile question at a time, refuses to let a vague answer pass, remembers every soft spot, and hands back a readiness report with the five questions you must drill. Brief it below and step into the room.

Convene your panel

The examiners prepare from what you give them. The better the brief, the more real the viva.

Panel temperament

Your brief stays in your browser and is sent only to run this rehearsal. Nothing is stored on our servers.

A human mock viva pulls its punches twice.

It costs a few hundred pounds, your supervisor is busy, and your friends want you to feel good. This one does not pull them at all, and it never gets tired of you. That is the whole point of a council that is paid to tell you no.

Four formats, one method

Your examination, not a generic one.

The UK viva voce

An internal and an external examiner, behind a closed door, for as long as it takes.

The US committee defense

A full committee, a public presentation, then the questions that decide it.

The European opponent duel

One appointed opponent, in public, whose job is to find where the work breaks.

The international panel

A mixed panel, mixed conventions, and no assumption you know the etiquette.

How it works

Three steps, then the room.

1

Brief the panel

Your field, your title, your abstract, and the contributions you claim are new. The panel prepares from exactly that, then examines you from your real examination format.

2

Face the questions

One hostile question at a time. It quotes your own brief back at you. If an answer is vague, it does not move on, it presses. It remembers every soft spot and resurfaces it harder.

3

Take the verdict

A readiness score, the answers that would hurt you with the stronger version written out, and the five questions you must drill before the real thing. An honest low score is the council working.

It will never tell you whether you pass. Nothing can. It tells you what you are before you walk in.

Stay in the loop

Hear the day the full tier opens.

The rehearsal room is free and open now. Leave your email for the day the full document-aware tier opens, with the founding price. Candidates first, doctoral schools after.

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