The paper deals with direct influence on reading proficiency and other advantages of application of metacognitive strategies by master students in order to improve ESL when learning Academic English course. There have been given definitions of the terms “reading strategy”, “metacognitive reading strategy”. The main structural components and functions of metacognitive strategies have been described, their role and priority of application by master students in academic texts processing have been estimated and discussed. Highly effective metacognitive reading strategies have been selected and correlated to academic performance level of readers. The main theoretical approaches regarding metacognition in reading have been overviewed and analyzed. The study has been conducted in Ternopil Volodymyr Hnatiuk National Pedagogical University. Data was collected by means of focus groups interview and selected scales of the MARSI (Metacognitive Awareness Reading Strategy Inventory) questionnaire. The highlighted research is of a descriptive character; it has been completed with the aim of collecting the information at the initial stage of the experiment on postgraduates’ usage of metacognitive reading strategies in their university course of Academic English. Data analysis was carried out with help of visualization of images of the text, main ideas/top sentences selection, scanning the text, summarizing information, self-questioning, connecting new information with the previously learnt one. Theoretically the study contributed by giving promising results about the impact of application of metacognitive reading strategies on reading proficiency of master students at Ternopil Volodymyr Hnatiuk National Pedagogical University. The practical implication presupposes incorporation of syllabus based reading comprehension courses for EFL master students as supplementary to the core courses or optional ones, based on practical teacher manuals on using metacognitive strategies in teaching reading comprehension; seminars for ESL teachers.