This paper reports a study that explored the overall pattern of metacognitive awareness of reading strategy use and its possible relationship with reading comprehension. Moreover, the study investigated the influence of gender and proficiency level on the use of these strategies. The Survey of Reading Strategies Questionnaire (SORS), the semi-structured interview technique, and a reading comprehension test were used to collect data from a randomly chosen sample. The data were analyzed through descriptive statistics to determine the frequency and type of strategies employed by the learners. Pearson coefficient correlation was also used to discover the relationship between reading strategy use and reading comprehension achievement. Moreover, one-way multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) was also employed to find out how the use of strategies varied according to gender. The results revealed that there was a strong positive correlation between reported metacognitive awareness of reading strategies and reading comprehension achievement. The results also showed that the students' knowledge of metacognitive reading strategies were significantly influenced by their levels of English proficiency. According to the findings, Iranian EFL students are moderately aware of reading strategies and the most frequently used strategies were the Support Reading Strategies (SUP), followed by Global Reading Strategies (GLOB), and then Problem-Solving Strategies (PROB). It was also revealed that no significant difference existed between male and female language learners in the use of reading strategies. The findings of this study may have implications for learners, teachers, and materials developers in the field of English language teaching and learning.