Band 4.0 IELTS Writing Task 1 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 4.0 · Cambridge IELTS 12 · 2026-09-18

IELTS Writing Task 1 question

The chart below shows how frequently people in the USA ate in fast food restaurants between 2003 and 2013.

Summarise the information by selecting and reporting the main features, and make comparisons where relevant.

 

Student answer (Band 4.0)

The bar graph represents that frequently people ate fast food resturant between 2003 and 2013 in USA.

AN overall analysis showed that 2013 high upto 30% once or twice a month. Insteadly, 2006 at 30% like as once a week. They shows high as compared to other.

incase of 2013, every day percentage of people ate fast food was around 2%.It was grew up to 15% in several times a week. highly increase was seen around at 25% incase of once a week. it was not a stopable and continousily increased upto 30% once or twice a month. incase of A FEW TIME A YEAR, ration of fast food ate people was suddenly decreased at 15% .

Secondly incase of 2003, every day was ate people fast food was at 5%.it was climbed up to 15% several times a week. specfic day it was rose up to 35% that was not stopable.incase of once or twice a month that was een minor decreased but Afew time a year it was fell to 10% incase a fewctimes a years. Incase of never it was on 5% that is a last point of ate people fast food.

AI examiner evaluation

Task Achievement / Task Response — Band 4.0

The response attempts to address the task by reporting features of the provided bar chart regarding fast food consumption in the USA from 2003 to 2013. However, the data representation contains numerous inaccuracies and misreadings of the chart. For example, the student states that in 2013 the percentage for 'every day' was around 2% and rose to 15% for 'several times a week', whereas the true figures are 3% and 16% respectively. Furthermore, the phrasing is extremely confused and difficult to follow, leading to a largely inadequate overview and poor selection of main features. This performance falls below the Band 5 threshold in terms of accurate data reporting.

Coherence and Cohesion — Band 4.5

The organisation of the text is highly problematic. The response is broken into erratic, fragmented paragraphs that lack logical sequencing and clear progression. Cohesive devices are either missing or misused, with repetitive and mechanical transitional phrases such as 'Incase of' appearing constantly throughout the text. Paragraphing is not used effectively to group related ideas, and the overall structure makes it very difficult for the reader to follow any coherent line of argument or data comparison.

Lexical Resource — Band 4.0

Vocabulary is extremely basic, repetitive, and heavily flawed. The student repeatedly relies on rudimentary phrases like 'ate people fast food' and misuses basic terminology ('resturant', 'ration', 'specfic'). There is almost no successful attempt at less common lexical items, and word choices frequently impede communication and strain the reader. Spelling errors ('continousily', 'een', 'Afew') further detract from the lexical score, placing the response firmly at Band 4.0.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy — Band 4.0

Grammatical control is weak throughout the response. There is a very limited range of sentence structures, and attempts at complex or descriptive sentences are consistently faulty (e.g., 'The bar graph represents that frequently people ate fast food resturant...' and 'It was grew up to 15%'). Errors in tense usage, subject-verb agreement, and prepositions are pervasive and frequent, often distorting the intended meaning and causing severe difficulty for the reader.

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

Browse more IELTS Writing model answers or get your own writing scored by the same AI examiner.