Band 6.5 IELTS Writing Task 1 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 6.5 · Cambridge IELTS 17 · 2026-10-07

IELTS Writing Task 1 question

The chart below gives information about how families in one country spent their weekly income in 1968 and in 2018.

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

1968 and 2018: average weekly spending by families

Student answer (Band 6.5)

The bar graph compares the spending of a home in a state during a week in 1968 and in 2018.

Overall, the major spending use to be food for a family in 1968 but it is leisure in 2018. The main increase in expenses has been observed in housing, leisure and transport expenditures while major drop happend in food expenses. The speding on household goods remained unchanged.

With regard to increased expenditures, the spending on leisure was less than 10% in 1968 which increased to over 20% in 2018 making it highest proportion of income in 2018. Other than than housing expenditures surged to around 20% from 10% during this period. Also transport expense became double reaching to around 14%.

On the other hand, food used to consum major proportion of income around 35% in 1968 which dropped to its half till 2018. The expenditures on clothing and footware used to be around 10% and it dropped to 5%. The same trend has been oberved for personal goods. The household goods spendings remained unchanged at around 7% during this period

AI examiner evaluation

Task Achievement / Task Response: Band 7.0

You identify the main contrast accurately: food was the largest category in 1968, while leisure became the largest in 2018. The overview also highlights the rise in housing and transport, the fall in food spending, and the unchanged household-goods figure, giving a clear account of the key features. Most reported values are consistent with the chart, including leisure rising from under 10% to over 20% and transport reaching about 14%. Some details are less precise: food fell from 35% to 17%, rather than exactly half, and household goods remained at 8%, not around 7%. To strengthen the response further, report these figures more accurately and make the comparison for personal goods explicit.

Coherence and Cohesion: Band 7.0

The response is organised into a clear introduction, an overview, and two body paragraphs grouped by increases and decreases. This gives the reader a logical route through the data, and linking phrases such as “With regard to” and “On the other hand” help signal the comparisons. The main progression is easy to follow, although some connections are awkward or repetitive: “Other than than” is unclear, and “The same trend” requires the reader to infer that personal-goods spending also fell. Use more precise referencing and transitions, and ensure each comparison is linked smoothly to the relevant category. These refinements would make the cohesion more flexible and less dependent on formulaic signposting.

Lexical Resource: Band 6.0

You use a reasonable range of task-related vocabulary, including “proportion of income,” “surged,” “dropped,” and “remained unchanged,” which allows you to describe the main movements. There are also attempts at more formal phrasing, such as “major spending” and “expenditures,” though some choices are unnatural or imprecise: “spending use to be,” “spending of a home,” and “food used to consum” do not express the intended ideas idiomatically. Spelling errors such as “speding,” “happend,” “footware,” and “oberved” also reduce accuracy. Aim for consistent, natural collocations such as “household spending” and “accounted for,” and proofread spelling and word forms.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy: Band 5.5

You attempt a mix of simple and more complex sentences, including comparisons with “while” and “which,” and the overall meaning is generally clear. However, some grammatical errors recur. For example, “The major spending use to be” has an incorrect verb form, while “the spending on leisure was less than 10% … which increased” creates an unclear relative clause. There are also problems with articles and sentence construction in “making it highest proportion,” and the final sentence lacks a full stop. Work on accurate past-tense forms, clause links, and articles—for example, “making it the highest proportion”—and check punctuation. More consistently accurate sentences would improve control without sacrificing the range you are attempting.

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