The Nelson Denny Reading Test (Brown, Fishco & Hanna, 1993) provides measures of comprehension, reading rate and vocabulary. It is widely used in research studies with high school and undergraduate students and for assessment purposes in the USA. No widely used test of this kind exists for adults in the UK. The present paper reports data from 197 undergraduates from the University of Essex on the Nelson Denny test. Analyses were carried out of the data in terms of degree type and year of study. The scores obtained with the present sample were higher than those reported in the manual of the Nelson Denny test for a subset of the standardisation sample. Possible reasons for this difference are discussed. Overall, the results suggest that the Nelson Denny test is suitable for use with UK undergraduate students.