Band 5.5 IELTS Writing Task 1 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 5.5 · Cambridge IELTS 15 · 2026-10-15

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 shows the coffee and tea buying and drinking habits in five Australian cities for the a time span of 4 weeks. The most popular habit from the chart is people going to a cafe for coffee or tea, while the most unpopular habit is buying fresh coffee. An outlier in this is the city of Adelaide where more people bought instant coffee rather than going to a cafe. The city of Melbourne had the most percentage of people going to a cafe as compared to other cities. Adelaide and Brisbane have the same percentage of people buying fresh coffee and is also the lowest among the five cities. Hobart had the most people who bought instant coffee as compared to the other cities. In all of the cities except Adelaide the most popular habit was going to a cafe followed by buying instant coffee and then buying fresh coffee.

AI examiner evaluation

Task Achievement / Task Response: Band 5.5

You identify several relevant overall features, including café visits as the leading activity in most cities, Adelaide as the exception, and the shared low for fresh-coffee purchases in Adelaide and Brisbane. However, the overview is not fully accurate: fresh coffee is not the least popular activity in every city, since in Adelaide café visits (about 49.5%) are slightly below fresh coffee (about 34.5%)—actually fresh coffee remains lower there too, but the response’s broader ranking needs clearer support. More importantly, the claim that Melbourne had the highest café figure is incorrect; Hobart is marginally highest, with Melbourne close behind. The response also contains only 140 words, below the 150-word minimum, and gives few figures to substantiate comparisons. Add accurate key values and develop the overview.

Coherence and Cohesion: Band 5.0

The response has a generally understandable sequence: it introduces the chart, gives an overview, and then compares cities and activities. Linking phrases such as “while,” “whereas” (implicit in the contrast), and “In all of the cities except Adelaide” help connect the comparisons. However, the whole answer is presented as one paragraph, so the overview and supporting details are not clearly separated. Several claims are packed together without numerical evidence, and the repeated pattern “The city of…” / “Hobart had…” makes the progression feel list-like rather than organised around the chart’s main comparisons. Use a brief overview paragraph followed by a paragraph comparing the three activities, and use clear references to the figures to make the relationships easier to follow.

Lexical Resource: Band 6.0

You use an adequate range of task-related vocabulary, including “outlier,” “percentage,” “bought instant coffee,” and “most popular habit,” and the meaning is generally clear. Some phrasing is repetitive, particularly the repeated use of “people” and “habit,” and “most percentage” is an imprecise collocation for describing a chart value. “For the a time span” is also an awkward expression, while “cafe” would conventionally be written “café” (though the meaning remains clear). To improve precision, use terms such as “proportion,” “share of residents,” and “recorded the highest figure,” and vary the wording for the three activities. The vocabulary is sufficient for the task, but more accurate collocations and less repetition would make the report more natural.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy: Band 6.0

You use a mix of simple and more complex sentence forms, and most of the comparisons are understandable. For example, “In all of the cities except Adelaide…” introduces a useful complex structure. Some grammatical errors remain: “for the a time span” contains an unnecessary article, “Adelaide and Brisbane have the same percentage … and is also the lowest” has a subject–verb agreement problem, and “had the most percentage” is not a well-formed comparison. The sentence beginning “An outlier in this…” is also awkwardly constructed. These issues do not usually prevent the reader from understanding your meaning, which is a strength. Check articles, agreement, and comparative sentence patterns, and use a wider range of accurately controlled structures when reporting figures.

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