GCSE English Language Paper 2 2026 Predictions: What AQA’s Questions and Unseen Texts Could Be

As an English teacher in the UK, I enjoy the short period of peace between the two GCSE Language Papers.  Paper 1 for 2026 has come and gone (I’m writing about the AQA exam). We now have a short respite from its brutal body blow before Paper 2 arrives in the ring and socks us squarely in the jaw for the knockout punch. OK, being an English teacher doesn’t necessarily make you much good with metaphors - I will admit that much. However, it also gives me some time to play my annual guessing game and to try and predict what is coming at us in Paper 2.

Before we look at my predictions for Paper 2, you are probably asking whether I got them right for Paper 1.  You can read my predictions for Paper 1 here, but essentitally - and at the risk of sounding a little Vicky Pollard (look her up) - yeah, but no, but yeah.  I did say “I am going to take a punt on the late 50s” and also this: “If they go with an American author, I am pretty sure they have been itching to use something by Shirley Jackson for years...”.  As luck would have it, the text for Paper 1 was Shirley Jackson’s “Haunting of Hill House” from 1959.   Although I did finally settle with other texts as my primary predictions (two were from 1959!), that’s not bad really, is it?  It taught me something (again) - always go with your gut.

What I Can Guarantee

So on to the predictions for the 2026 GCSE English Language Paper 2.  We can start with something that we know for certain.  As ever, Source B will be from the nineteenth century (between 1801 and 1900).  Paper 1’s text was from 1959, as we discovered on 21 May, so that means that Source A in Paper 2 will be from 2001 – 2020s.  Why? That’s because AQA always uses sources from this and the previous two centuries - one from each.  That Source A will definitely be from the 2000s is not a huge reveal; it follows a general trend across the last ten exams – 6 of the “modern” texts in Paper 2 were from the twenty-first century.  However, at least that's one thing we can say with certainty.

I have quite a good track record for Paper 2 – I predicted the general topics of the last two papers – in a very general way of course!  As we had had travel and professions in the 2024 exams, I predicted that it would be something about the natural world next (it was) and then my prediction for the November 2025 paper was something more urban (it was).  I make my guesses (for that is what they are and  - I must add – are just a little idle fun because being a teacher I have nothing better to do) based on history. I do try to make my guesses more than just educated, by looking at what has come before.

A quick note before moving on: if you believe that liking the subject of the texts in Paper 2 and enjoying reading them has anything to do with how well you are going to do - think again. That's not the the point of them at all. They have to be accessible, yes. However, ultimately the topic chosen is an irrelevence - so much so I sometimes wonder why I do these yearly predictions. I could just say "it's going to be about water in one of its three forms" and there's a good chance I would be right - AQA seems to love to include water in Paper 2.  We've had ice on mountains, water in lakes and oceans, rainstorms, surfing - the list goes on.  So, stop reading now!

Joking apart, for Paper 2, I try to divine a ten-exam-pattern (I use the last eight for Paper 1) to extrapolate likely subjects for the source texts as well as the other questions.  So, here is our preliminary data… the last ten Paper 2s.

I am going to rely on some maths (English teachers say that more often than you might think). On average, AQA chooses a modern Source A text written about six years before the exam.  When you think about it, they can't put exams together, sort out copyright, butcher the texts to fit the questions, do mark schemes, print them (and so on) just a few weeks before the exam, so the chances of it being really recent are slim. So, I am going to say that Source A will be from 2018 (although it would not surprise me to see one from a little later). As for Source B, the average time difference between a 19^th and a 21^st century text has been 143 years.  Now, I know that this is not how AQA do it, because that would be plainly daft, but just for fun I will say that the text is going to be from 1883 – exactly 143 years ago.   Out of the six from the 1800s, two were from the 1880s. So that does make a certain sense. It's close enough to our own time for the writing to feel quite modern, but not so far back that students leave the exam complaining that Source B was written by Shakespeare...

Based on the above data, I will make a single prediction – and then suggest a few more alternatives for Paper 2 2026. 

PREDICTION

Source A - c. 2018

First is a modern reflective travel/gap-year experience. So, I think the text that we will get is a piece of personal journalism for Source A – by a female writer.  It will be modern (obviously), and I think we will get something involving travel and experience.  In other words, travelling to do something productive rather than a holiday.  For example, it could be a gap year memoir, with a diary-stye narrative. The aim of the travel could be to help build a hospital or school in some far-flung place which would open the text up to the inclusion of emotional reactions and perspectives. This is just an example scenario, of course but reflective travel has a high chance of coming up. For this, someone like Greta Thunberg is perhaps too politically recognizable, so it might be writers like Scarlett Curtis, Pandora Sykes or Monica Ali. Then again...

Source B - c. 1883

If we “follow the money”, then this will be a male author.  To counterpoint Source A, this could be something about travel to enrich oneself through the educational experiences. The Grand Tour (an educational European journey undertaken by wealthy people during the eighteenth century) was a little out of fashion by Victorian times but Grand Tour-style cultural travel continued throughout the nineteenth century.  It would focus on personal enrichment through knowledge rather than necessarily helping others and so could balance the two different  perspectives well.  I would like to see Lord Byron here, but as he died in 1824, inclusion of any of his letters about his travels would make it the oldest text ever used in GCSE English Language.  So, not happening (although AQA can be a little perverse in their choices).  More likely would be Robert Louis Stevenson, whose Travels with a Donkey in the Cévennes (1879, so my “date” for this paper would have to change!) is still a charming read.  I would love it if this came up.  Modestine the donkey is a wonderful character, stubborn and manipulative. I adored this book when I was a kid. It's not The Grand Tour but is someone doing something just for the fun of it (although Stevenson went on his travels to help mend a broken heart). Other possibilities when it comes to great Victorian travel writing (and who haven’t been used by AQA yet) include George Borrow, Henry James and William Hazlitt.

Other Possibilities

As you know, the above is quite likely to be wrong, being a needle in a haystack guess.  For example, say AQA go with Stevenson's Travels with a Donkey, then it is possible that Source A will be a lighthearted account of another human/animal interaction and not about building a school/hospital.  The permutations and combinations at play as possibilities here are enormous.  However, although the above is my favourite, I did have a few more thoughts.  Here are some other possibilities.

• Progress – technological or otherwise.  The Source B (1800s) writer could celebrate progress and its speed – enabled by the Industrial Revolution (travel, cheaper goods – the usual pros).  The Source A (2000s) writer could be more cautious about the impact that progress is having on our lives (surveillance, social media – the usual cons).
• Comparing Cultures - Source A (2000s): A youngish person reflecting on growing up between cultures, or navigating modern expectations around identity, school, or community. Source B (1800s): A Victorian writer describing the rigid rules of society, manners, or class - someone travelling or observing social customs.
• Stress - Source A (2000s): A youngish person describing stress, overwork, exam pressure, or the feeling of being constantly measured (sounds like Greta again! Why do I keep coming back to her?). Source B (1800s): A Victorian writer describing factory work, apprenticeships, or the harsh realities of labour during the Industrial Revolution.

What about Question 5?

AQA hasn’t used a letter since 2022, so it’s overdue in rotation.  However, the last times AQA used speeches, they were bundled together in consecutive exams.  That could happen again – November’s Q5 was a speech.  So, (of course), AQA know that we are all playing the guessing game and might just go with another speech, just to be perversely capricious or capriciously perverse (I really don’t think it is going to be an article!).  If I had to choose (and I do, because I’m writing this), then it would have to be a letter for June 2026.  It could look something like this:

Maybe mentioning exams in an exam is a little too meta for AQA.  Regardless, why is this a good prediction?  AQA loves to echoe the deeper ideas of the sources without directly copying them.  As such, this is a perfect thematic match. This kind of question is a strong prediction, I believe, because it fits both what AQA usually does and what they haven’t done for a while. A letter is the most overdue text type - we haven’t seen one since 2022 - and AQA normally switches things up after a run of articles and speeches - but they know that we know that. The topic also matches the kind of issues that come up in Paper 2: what success means, how young people are judged, and what really matters in education. Writing to an MP feels realistic, persuasive and relevant, which is exactly the kind of task AQA likes to set.

Now, don’t throw your rattle out of the pram if a letter does come up.  Ah, the number of times I have heard bleated variations of “I don’t like writing [insert text type]; I prefer to write [insert text type].  As I explain in this article, it really doesn’t matter which type of text you are asked to write!  As you can see from my predicted letter question above, you could just insert the "speech" or "article" instruction into the question and it would make no difference, frankly.  Your ability to write a letter is not judged as such - it's your ability to communicate and connect with your audience (put simply) and to organise your work.  That's why they call the mark out of 24 for this question Content and Organisation!

What about the other questions? Let's have a look at some data about how they have appeared over the last ten exams.

For Question 2, it’s almost bound to be what you can infer about the differences between two things.  My bet (given my prediction) would be the differences between two places.  The modern text could focus on a very poor place – where one might expect volunteer work to be done by someone on their gap year.  The Victorian text – if it is about The Grand Tour could be a very grand or historic place – such as the amphitheatre in Rome.  Or it could remain with an impoverished poor place - as in Stevenson's Travels with a Donkey.

For Question 3, it’s likely to be a description of an experience. With my predicted paper, this would be along the lines of “How does the writer use language to describe her experience of volunteering abroad?”. The paragraph (or two) could focus on a specific moment, such as the first time she arrives at the building site, the physical effort of carrying materials in the heat, or the sense of connection she feels when working alongside local people. These kinds of vivid, sensory details give students plenty of language to analyse - verbs showing movement, adjectives describing atmosphere, and figurative language capturing emotion - which fits the pattern of recent Q3s that focus on a clear, memorable experience rather than a place or a feeling on its own.

AQA might be able to squish the 19th century text in here.  What a field day some students might have with this paragraph from Stevenson's Travels with a Donkey:

For my part, I travel not to go anywhere, but to go. I travel for travel's sake. The great affair is to move; to feel the needs and hitches of our life more clearly; to come down off this feather-bed of civilization, and find the globe granite underfoot and strewn with cutting flints. Alas, as we get up in life, and are more preoccupied with our affairs, even a holiday is a thing that must be worked for. To hold a pack upon a pack-saddle against a gale out of the freezing north is no high industry, but it is one that serves to occupy and compose the mind. And when the present is so exacting who can annoy himself about the future?

For Question 4, it is most likely to be the different feelings and perspectives (thoughts and feelings might appear in the question rather than perspectives).  So, taking my predicted paper, this could be the differences between why they travelled in the first place – the first to help people, the second to help themselves (culturally and educationally).  So, they both may have travelled to enrich themselves (one way or another) so the intentions of both writers might be good but one will be selfless and the other selfish (essentially), so their feelings about what they have experienced will differ.

So, there you have it – my predictions.  They are probably completely and utterly wrong, but I had fun writing this – and I hope you had some reading my waffle.  Good luck in Paper 2!

Tomorrow's the day, so take your chance,
Read with care and make words dance.
Pick your evidence, explain it well,
Show the examiner what you can tell.

Stay calm, stay focused, give it your all,
One question at a time, no matter how small.
You've worked hard and come so far.
Now go and show them how brilliant you are!