Band 6.5 IELTS Writing Task 2 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 6.5 · Cambridge IELTS 14 · 2026-08-15

IELTS Writing Task 2 question

Many people work long hours, leaving very little time for leisure activities.

Does this situation have more advantages or more disadvantages?

Give reasons for your answer and include any relevant examples from your own knowledge or experience.

 

Student answer (Band 6.5)

In this modern era, everyone gives more priority to their worklife rather than keeping a balance between professional and personal life. Being workaholic, they are becoming deprived from their leisure time that they can use to relax and enhance coginitive skills and personal relations. In my opinion, this situation has more negatives sides.

Working longer hours has adverse effects on health and making people less active. Because when person is occupied with work and not having time for doing exercise and other activities like cycling or walking then their body become more prone to diseases. Leisure time is incredibly important for a human being to stay healthy and to forget their all work worries. For instance, people who are working longer hours are spending most of their free time resting at home as they are already physically tired that can eventually leads to the sedentary lifestyle and various health issues.

Working longer hours can leave people with very little or no time to develop new skills. when employees are working for longer hours, they feel exhausted afterwards and are not able to devote sufficient time to improve their skills and abilities. As a result, they may miss opportuinities for personal and professional growth. For example, if a person works for ten-twelve hours may not able to have enough time or energy to attend evening course or learn new language.

Overall, work-life balance should be necessary to have a healthy lifestyle and to develop in personal and professional life. Otherwise, a workaholic human can deprive themselves from many opportunities by not having sufficient time to improve their natural talents

AI examiner evaluation

Task Achievement / Task Response — Band 6.5

The response addresses the prompt by clearly stating a position that the disadvantages outweigh the advantages. The ideas regarding health and personal development are relevant and logically extended. However, the development is somewhat repetitive; for example, the discussion on 'working longer hours' is repeated in both body paragraphs without introducing distinct new perspectives. To reach a higher band, you should ensure that each paragraph explores a unique facet of the argument rather than restating the premise. The conclusion is a bit brief and could have better synthesised the main points to reinforce your position more strongly.

Coherence and Cohesion — Band 7.0

The essay is logically organised with a clear introduction, two body paragraphs, and a conclusion. Paragraphing is used appropriately to separate distinct ideas. You use some cohesive devices such as 'For instance', 'As a result', and 'Otherwise', which help guide the reader. However, some transitions are slightly mechanical, and the flow between sentences could be smoother. For instance, the transition between the health argument and the personal development argument could be improved with more sophisticated linking phrases. Overall, the progression of ideas is clear, and the essay is easy to follow.

Lexical Resource — Band 6.0

You demonstrate an adequate range of vocabulary for the task, using terms like 'adverse effects', 'sedentary lifestyle', and 'cognitive skills'. There are some minor spelling errors, such as 'coginitive' and 'opportuinities', and some awkward collocations like 'workaholic human'. While the vocabulary is sufficient to convey your meaning clearly, it lacks the precision and variety required for a higher band. To improve, focus on using more sophisticated synonyms and ensuring accurate word choice in context. The range is sufficient for the task but does not show the flexibility or precision of higher bands.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy — Band 6.0

You use a mix of simple and complex sentence structures. While your meaning is generally clear, there are several grammatical errors, such as 'making people less active' (should be 'makes'), 'when person is occupied' (missing article 'a'), and 'can eventually leads' (subject-verb agreement error). Additionally, there are punctuation issues, such as missing commas after introductory clauses. While these errors do not impede communication, they occur frequently enough to prevent a higher score. Focusing on subject-verb agreement and article usage will significantly improve the accuracy of your writing.

See this exact question answered at other band scores — the same prompt compared across bands.

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