IELTS Task 1 Practice: Six Questions With Marked Answers

Most Task 1 practice is half of an exercise. You find a chart, you write 150 words, and then nothing happens. Nobody tells you which sentence was worth marks and which one was filler, so the next answer repeats the same habits.

This page gives you the missing half. Six questions to practise with, one answer written out in full, and the reasoning a marker applies to it line by line.

Task 1 is the shorter of the two writing tasks. You have about 20 minutes and you must write at least 150 words. In Academic IELTS you describe a chart, table, map or process. In General Training you write a letter.

Six practice questions

Three Academic, three General Training. Use the ones that match your test.

The data for question 1

A chart is only useful for practice if you have the numbers. Here are the figures the bar chart in question 1 would show, so you can write a real answer from this page.

A full answer to question 1

The bar chart compares the proportion of library users in four age bands in 2005 and 2020. Overall, library use fell in every group except the oldest, where it rose sharply, so the typical user in 2020 was considerably older than in 2005. In 2005 the youngest group were the heaviest users, with 62 per cent visiting a library, followed by 41 per cent of those aged 18 to 34. Both figures had dropped by 2020, to 48 and 22 per cent respectively. The decline among 18 to 34 year olds was the steepest of any group, cutting that figure almost in half. The pattern for people aged 60 and over ran in the opposite direction. Only 29 per cent of them used a library in 2005, the lowest share of all four groups, but by 2020 the figure had reached 44 per cent, placing them second overall. Use among 35 to 59 year olds fell more modestly, from 38 to 31 per cent.

That is 164 words, written in about 20 minutes, with no opinion and no invented explanation of why the change happened.

What a marker looks at

Task 1 is marked on four criteria, each worth the same amount. The names are worth learning, because they tell you what to check.

Task Achievement asks whether you covered the requirements. Three things carry it: an overview, accurate figures, and no missing group. The answer above states the overview in the second sentence, which is the single highest value sentence in any Task 1 response. It names a pattern, not a number: use fell everywhere except among the oldest. An answer with no overview cannot reach the higher bands, however good the English is.

Coherence and Cohesion asks whether the reader can follow it without effort. The answer groups the two declining young groups in one paragraph and the contrasting older groups in the next. That grouping is the organisation. Linking words such as "followed by" and "in the opposite direction" are useful, but a paragraph plan does more work than any connector.

Lexical Resource asks about vocabulary range and precision. Notice "proportion", "share" and "per cent" doing the same job in different sentences, and verbs of change that carry a size: "dropped", "fell more modestly", "the steepest". Repeating "increased" four times is the most common weakness in this task.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy asks for a mix of structures with few errors. The answer uses past simple, past perfect, comparatives and one relative clause. Notice that the sentences are not long. Length is not the point; a long sentence you cannot control costs more than a short one you can.

Three habits that lose marks here

1. Describing every number in order. A Task 1 answer is a summary. Select. You will not have room for all eight figures above, and listing them with no grouping reads as a table rewritten into sentences.
2. Explaining the cause. The chart does not say why library use fell, so writing that people now read online is an invention. Task 1 rewards accurate reporting, not theories.
3. Writing an opinion. There is no place for "I think" in Academic Task 1. Save it for Task 2.

A two week practice routine

Six questions is a fortnight of work if you use them properly.

1. Day one. Write question 1 under timed conditions, 20 minutes, no dictionary.
2. Day two. Read it again cold. Underline your overview sentence. If you cannot find one, that is your first fix.
3. Day three. Rewrite the same answer, changing only the vocabulary of change. Do not repeat any verb.
4. Repeat with the next question. Two questions a week, written once and rewritten once, teaches more than six written once each.

Keep every version. The improvement between your first draft and your third rewrite is the thing you are actually practising.

Checking your own answer

The hard part of practice alone is that you cannot see your own blind spots. A second opinion helps, whether that comes from a teacher, a study partner, or a tool. You can paste a Task 1 answer into Bandly and get an estimated band for each of the four criteria with the sentences that drove it, which at least tells you where to look next. The estimates come from a language model, not from a qualified examiner, so treat them as a direction rather than a verdict.

If you want to see full answers next to the bands they were given, the sample library has marked Task 1 answers for line graphs, bar charts, process diagrams and General Training letters. Read one, then write question 2 above and compare the shape of the two answers rather than the topic.