Band 5.5 IELTS Writing Task 1 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 5.5 · Cambridge IELTS 15 · 2026-09-30

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)

The chart illustrates the outcomes of a survey regarding people's coffee and tea purchasing and drinking habits in fives Australian cities such as Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Adelaide and Hobart.

Overall,during the past month going to cafe for coffee or tea was the most common habit in Hobart, Melbourne and Sydney.

However, buying the instant coffee was more common than the fresh coffee in all fives cities. In the past four weeks going to a cafe had the highest percentage than the buying instant and fresh coffee. Additionally, Melbourne had the highest percentage of cafe visitors roughly at 63%. However, Hobart had the highest percentage buying instant coffee around 54%.Although Sydney had the highest proportion buying fresh coffee(about 44%). Moveover, Adelaide was the only city where cafe visitors and instant coffee purchases were at approximately equal at each 50%. Therefore,in the last four weeks buying the fresh coffee was least percentage ratio in four cities except Sydney.

AI examiner evaluation

Task Achievement / Task Response: Band 5.5

The student addresses all parts of the task by covering the three main survey categories across the five Australian cities. An overview is attempted in the second paragraph, noting that going to a café was most common in Hobart, Melbourne, and Sydney, while instant coffee was more popular than fresh coffee overall. However, there are some inaccurate data comparisons and misinterpretations of the chart. For instance, the text states that Melbourne had the highest percentage of café visitors at roughly 63%, but Hobart is actually very close at 63%, and Melbourne's value is 63.5%. Furthermore, the claim that 'Adelaide was the only city where cafe visitors and instant coffee purchases were at approximately equal' is incorrect, as Adelaide shows 49.5% for cafés and 50% for instant, but other cities show different relationships. Additionally, some data points are misreported or generalized incorrectly, placing the response at a Band 6.0 level.

Coherence and Cohesion: Band 5.5

The response has a clear overall arrangement and attempts to organize information logically with an introduction, an overview, and body details. However, the paragraphing is poorly handled; almost the entire body of the response is crammed into a single, dense block of text following the introduction, which detracts from effective progression. Cohesive devices are used ('However', 'Additionally', 'Therefore'), but they are sometimes repetitive or mechanically applied, and referencing is occasionally unclear. For example, transition words are overused in close succession without clear thematic grouping of the data. Paragraphing needs to be used more purposefully to separate distinct trends, resulting in a Band 5.5 score.

Lexical Resource: Band 5.5

The student uses an adequate range of vocabulary for the task, successfully incorporating terms such as 'outcomes', 'proportion', 'purchasing', and 'survey'. However, there are noticeable lexical and grammatical errors involving word choice and article usage, such as 'fives Australian cities', 'buying the instant coffee', and 'least percentage ratio'. There are also minor typos like 'Moveover' instead of 'Moreover'. While the vocabulary is sufficient to convey the general meaning, the presence of these inaccurate word formations and collocation errors keeps the lexical score at a Band 6.0.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy: Band 5.5

The writer attempts a mix of simple and complex sentence forms, utilizing subordinate clauses introduced by 'Although' and 'while'. However, grammatical accuracy is inconsistent. There are frequent errors in articles ('the instant coffee', 'the fresh coffee', 'highest percentage ratio'), prepositions ('at each 50%', 'buying instant coffee around 54%'), and punctuation/spacing issues (missing spaces after periods, such as 'Overall,during' and 'Therefore,in'). Furthermore, awkward phrasing like 'cafe visitors and instant coffee purchases were at approximately equal at each 50%' demonstrates strain in grammatical control. These recurring errors occasionally disrupt readability, placing this criterion at a Band 5.5.

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