The CEnT-S test for Italy, from Bangladesh: what is on it, when to sit it, and the one university that will not accept it from home

At a glance: CEnT-S is CISIA's entrance test in English for bachelor's programmes in engineering, the sciences and economics. For sittings from November 2026 it has 65 questions in 140 minutes, across six sections. You can sit it once per macro-period, and the fee is EUR 55. From Dhaka you take it at home (CEnT@HOME), with a laptop and a phone. Sit it in the November to January period: that gives you a result before the first non-EU application windows close, and leaves room for a second attempt. One exception matters: Politecnico di Torino will not accept an at-home result for 2027/28.

Until autumn 2025, an English-taught bachelor's at an Italian public university usually meant an English TOLC: TOLC-I for engineering, TOLC-E for economics, TOLC-F for pharmacy. CISIA, the consortium that runs these tests for its member universities, replaced all three in November 2025 with one test, the CEnT-S (CISIA English Test – Sciences). Most guides you will find still describe the first version of it. This one describes the test you will actually sit for September 2027 entry, checked on CISIA's own pages on 14 November 2026.

Who uses it

A CEnT-S score is not an admission. Each university decides whether it uses the test, which sections count, what minimum it sets, and whether it accepts the at-home version. The table shows what we have checked on the universities' own pages.

The rule that follows from this table: read the call (*bando*) for your exact programme before you book. Two universities can both "use CEnT-S" and still count different sections or set different minimums.

The test in 2027/28

CISIA's rules say the structure changed for sittings from 1 November 2026. Here it is.

The 2025/26 test had 55 questions in 110 minutes, with no Reading section. If a guide or a prep course shows you 55 questions, it is describing last year's test.

Scoring. A correct answer gets 1 point, a blank gets 0, and a wrong answer loses 0.25. So guess only when you can rule out at least one option; a blind guess usually gains nothing. No calculator is allowed, at home or at a university, so practise arithmetic, algebra and unit conversions by hand.

The score that counts is not the one you see at the end. When you finish you see your raw summary at once. CISIA then adjusts each section for how hard its questions turned out to be (the normalised score), adds the sections up, and publishes the official total in your CISIA Student Area. For this cycle CISIA's rules say it does so by the last day of the last month of each period. A university may also give different weights to different sections.

The five periods, and when to sit

From November 2026 to October 2027 the test runs in five macro-periods. You may sit it once per period. You can book the next period from the day after your test, without waiting for the result.

For a student in Bangladesh, period 1 is the one to aim at. Padua's non-EU window closes on 7 March 2027, and a test in February or March gets its official score only at the end of March. Padua asks for proof that you registered for the CEnT-S, and the result where it is required. If you are relying on a February or March sitting, ask Padua in writing whether a score that arrives after 7 March will count.

The national clock pushes the same way. Every university can validate only a limited number of non-EU pre-enrolments on Universitaly: its allocation plus at most 20 percent (the validation cap). The visa deadline for 2027/28 is 31 October 2027. A test in June or August leaves no room for a refusal, a retake or a slow visa appointment.

Validity. CISIA says a CEnT is valid only for the year in which you take it. For the 2025/26 cycle, that meant results from 1 November 2025 to 31 October 2026, used for 2026/27 entry. CISIA has not yet published the same sentence for the current cycle, so treat a result from before November 2026 as finished, and check your university's call.

Taking it at home, from Dhaka

The test comes in two formats: CEnT@UNI, sat in a computer room at an Italian university, and CEnT@HOME (the Italian calendar calls it CEnT@CASA). Unless you are in Italy, you will take it at home. CISIA's rules for the home version are strict, and some of them catch people out.

• A laptop, not a desktop, with a built-in front camera (an external webcam is not accepted), plugged into power, running Windows 10 or later or macOS 13 or later.
• The Horizon app installed on that laptop before the day of the test. It is compulsory.
• A phone or tablet with a camera, running the latest Webex app. It films you and your screen from behind for the whole test.
• No VPN or proxy, and you must take the test in the country you named when you booked.
• Data: about 50 MB on the laptop and about 1 GB on the phone.
• No calculator, no headphones, no smartwatch, and nobody else in the room.

Two practical points from Bangladesh. First, a power cut is your problem, not CISIA's. CISIA gives a free rebooking credit when the problem is on its side, but no credit if your laptop or connection did not meet the rules. Run the laptop from an IPS or UPS, and keep mobile data ready as a second connection. Second, do a full rehearsal on the same laptop, phone and network a few days before.

Booking. You register and book in the CISIA Student Area with an identity document. Booking closes at 2:00 p.m. Italian time about a week before each test date (CISIA publishes a weekday-by-weekday table). A paid booking cannot be cancelled, but you can change its date, its university or its format. The EUR 55 is not refunded; if you miss the test, you get one credit to book another free of charge. CISIA states the EUR 55 for tests from November 2025 to October 2026 and has not yet stated the 2026/27 figure. You can ask CISIA to review a test within 30 days.

Finding a seat. At-home sessions are listed on CISIA's calendar under each host university, and you can book a session hosted by any university, wherever you plan to apply. Seats come and go. Our live CEnT-S tracker checks the at-home sessions every 15 minutes and can alert you when one opens.

Politecnico di Torino: an at-home score will not count

From 2027/28, Politecnico di Torino joins CISIA and uses its tests in place of its own TIL. Its admission page says that only tests sat in person, at Politecnico or another university, will be accepted, and that CEnT@CASA and TOLC@CASA will not be accepted. The page names no exception for applicants abroad, and its 2027/28 calls were not yet published on 14 November 2026. For a student in Bangladesh, this means a Turin bachelor's needs a test sat at a university in Italy. If Turin is your first choice, write to its admissions office before you plan anything else.

What a CEnT-S score does not do

It is not an English certificate. The test is in English, but universities ask for English proof separately: Sapienza's call, for example, requires B2 on top of the test. For the visa, the Embassy of Italy in Dhaka asks for a language certificate, and for English that means IELTS 6.0, unless the university has already verified your English on Universitaly. Our Italy language guide explains the two stages.

A low section score can follow you after admission. Some universities admit you but attach an OFA (*obblighi formativi aggiuntivi*, additional learning requirements) when one section is weak. At Ca' Foscari, for Digital Management, the maths OFA has to be cleared by 30 September of the year after you enrol; until then you cannot sit any exam in your study plan.

Claims you will meet that are wrong

• "55 questions, 110 minutes." That was 2025/26. From November 2026 it is 65 questions in 140 minutes, with a Reading section.
• "Embassy deadline 29 October." The national visa deadline for 2027/28 is 31 October 2027; for 2026/27 it is 30 November 2026. See the deadline.
• "About EUR 6,000 a year in funds." The figure is EUR 10,179.85 a year, and there is no official monthly figure.
• "IELTS or TOEFL for the visa." The Dhaka embassy's list has only IELTS for English.
• "Politecnico di Torino accepts CEnT-S from home." Not for 2027/28.

The rest of the route is the same as for any Italian bachelor's: qualification comparability through CIMEA or a Declaration of Value, then the Type D visa checklist. For engineering in particular, read studying engineering in Italy. For the whole country, see our Italy guide.