The purpose of this study was to explore the effects of vocabulary knowledge on ESL learners’ reading comprehension performance. To achieve its ultimate objective, 150 students from English departmentKhawaja Freed College, RahimYar Khan participated in this study in 2022. The outcome of this study indicated that the students performed better in reading comprehension test who have vocabulary knowledge as compare to the students who depend on the background knowledge. So after this discussion we find out that vocabulary learning is more important for ESL college students.

background knowledge, vocabulary knowledge, reading comprehension