Band 4.5 IELTS Writing Task 2 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 4.5 · IELTS General Essentials · 2026-09-30

IELTS Writing Task 2 question

Smoking can cause serious illnesses and should be made illegal.

To what extent do you agree?

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

Student answer (Band 4.5)

In the recent years smoking has become increasingly prevelent among people even though it is the reason behind numerous health problems and many people think it should be ban by government. I do not support an outright ban on smoking. This essay will discuss reasons behind this view.

It is irrefutable that the smoking is common amongs the youngster nowadays. Numerous people claim that by smoking they find sense of relief from stressful day. By doing smoking they get relaxed. M

AI examiner evaluation

Task Achievement / Task Response: Band 4.0

The response only minimally addresses the task prompt regarding whether smoking should be made illegal, as it is cut short after very few sentences and fails to fully develop an argument. Furthermore, the length requirement of at least 250 words has not been met, as the student has written a mere 81 words. While the writer manages to state a basic position in the introduction by noting, "I do not support an outright ban on smoking," the ideas remain severely under-developed and incomplete. To improve, the student must ensure they write a fully fleshed-out essay that explores both sides of the argument with relevant supporting points and examples, while strictly adhering to the minimum word count.

Coherence and Cohesion: Band 4.5

The essay displays some basic attempts at organization, such as using transitional phrases like "This essay will discuss reasons behind this view." However, due to the extremely truncated nature of the response, there is no clear overall progression of ideas, and the text ends abruptly in the middle of a sentence with a stray letter "M". Paragraphing is attempted by separating the introduction from the body paragraph, but the lack of content prevents cohesive devices from being effectively utilized. To reach a higher level, the writer needs to structure multiple cohesive body paragraphs that logically sequence ideas and build a coherent, connected argument throughout the entire essay.

Lexical Resource: Band 5.0

The vocabulary used throughout the response is fairly basic and limited in range. There are also noticeable spelling and word choice errors, such as "prevelent" instead of prevalent, "ban" instead of banned, and "amongs the youngster" instead of among youngsters. The phrases employed, such as "find sense of relief" and "get relaxed," are repetitive and lack precision. To improve lexical resource, the student should expand their vocabulary by learning less common lexical items, improving collocation awareness, and carefully checking their spelling and grammatical forms to ensure accurate expression.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy: Band 5.0

The text demonstrates a very limited range of sentence structures, relying primarily on simple patterns with frequent grammatical inaccuracies. Errors such as "In the recent years" (incorrect article usage) and "by doing smoking they get relaxed" (awkward phrasing and structural error) strain the reader's understanding. While some simple sentences are formed correctly, attempts at more complex phrasing tend to be faulty. To achieve a higher band, the writer must incorporate a wider variety of complex sentence structures while improving grammatical accuracy and avoiding frequent errors in prepositions, verb forms, and articles.

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

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