Band 5.5 IELTS Writing Task 1 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 5.5 · Cambridge IELTS 15 · 2026-09-11

IELTS Writing Task 1 question

The chart below shows the results of a survey about people’s coffee and tea buying and drinking habits in five Australian cities.

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

Student answer (Band 5.5)

This chart illustrate the result of a survey about people's coffee and tea buying and drinking habits in five Australian cities. Percentage of city residents ranges between 10%-70%. Start talking about sydney there is 44% people who bought fresh coffee in last four weeks whereas 42% in Melbourne , 33% in Brisbane, 34% in Adelaide and 37% in Hobart. Moving to the percentage of city residents who bought instant coffee in last 4 weeks; this is 46% for Sydney, 47% for melbourne, 52% for brisbane, 50% for Adelaide and 54% of Hobart. The final stage of survey was about the people who went to a cafe for coffee or tea in last 4 weeks. That is 61% for Sydney, 63% for Melbourne, 56% for Brisbane, 49% for Adelaide and 63% for Hobart. Ultimately the chart shows the highest percentage for the people who preferred cafe instead of fresh or instant coffee.

AI examiner evaluation

Task Achievement / Task Response — Band 5.5

The response covers all parts of the task by identifying the three categories and the five cities. However, the report is essentially a list of data points rather than a summary of main features. While you mention the highest percentage at the end, you fail to highlight significant trends or make meaningful comparisons between the cities. For example, noting that Hobart consistently shows high figures across categories or contrasting the popularity of cafe visits versus fresh coffee would have demonstrated a better grasp of the data. To improve, focus on grouping information and identifying key trends rather than listing every individual figure.

Coherence and Cohesion — Band 5.0

The response is organised into a single block of text, which makes it difficult to follow. There is a lack of paragraphing to separate the introduction from the body of the report. While you use some cohesive devices like 'Moving to' and 'The final stage', the progression of ideas feels mechanical and repetitive. The transition between the data points is abrupt, and the lack of clear paragraph structure hinders the flow of information. Using clear paragraphs for each category or city grouping would significantly improve the logical progression of your response.

Lexical Resource — Band 5.5

The vocabulary is adequate for the task but remains quite basic and repetitive. You rely heavily on phrases like 'percentage of city residents' and 'in last 4 weeks'. There is little attempt to use a wider range of vocabulary to describe trends or data variations. For instance, instead of repeating 'percentage', you could use terms like 'proportion', 'figure', or 'rate'. Additionally, there are minor errors in capitalization, such as 'sydney', 'melbourne', 'brisbane', and 'adelaide', which should always be capitalized as they are proper nouns.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy — Band 5.0

The response contains several grammatical errors that affect the accuracy of the writing. There are subject-verb agreement issues, such as 'This chart illustrate' (should be 'illustrates') and 'there is 44% people' (should be 'there are 44% of people'). The sentence structure is largely simple, with limited use of complex sentences. Punctuation is also inconsistent, particularly with the use of semicolons and commas. To reach a higher band, focus on correcting basic subject-verb agreement and incorporating a wider variety of complex sentence structures to describe the data more fluently.

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