Band 6.5 IELTS Writing Task 2 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 6.5 · Cambridge IELTS 14 · 2026-08-26

IELTS Writing Task 2 question

Some people say the main way to be happy in life is to have a lot of money. How might having a lot of money make people happy? What other things in life can make people happy?

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

 

Student answer (Band 6.5)

In recent years, financial wealth is often seen as a key to happiness. This trend is primarily driven by covering fundamental needs and selection between choices for leisure time. Although having plenty of factors to make people happy, other factors are equally vital. Therefore, this essay will discuss reasons along with relevant examples in the forthcoming paragraphs.

First and foremost, money is essential for reducing survival stress and buys freedom. To elaborate, money is the only way to provide security in terms of fundamental needs such as food, clothes, house and medical needs. Thus, by having financial stability, people have freedom to buy essential needs to live healthier life, whereas they need to struggle to satisfy their wants, if they do not have it. In addition to that, not only options between different things but also peace of mind is only possible because of money. To illustrate, people can afford some lavish products such as gym equipment and protein food, and it enhances their quality of live by offering fitness. Apart from this, it assists in reducing stress level due to higher satisfaction level in order to get certain income to spend.

Nevertheless, even though having financial capabilities, people may feel lonely without their friends and family. Sometimes, they might face a plenty of problems related to depression as they can purchase expensive goods but they do not have any human connection. Thus, money is not valuable in this case. Moreover, career achievement and well established behaviour is the essential part of the life which provide opportunity to achieve social status in community. For example, people with the good manner can easily obtain respect in society, while selfish people with money may discriminate. Hence, this core human expertise helps people to survive in this contemporary world.

In conclusion, despite having advantages of money like financial stability and sense of desire in order to get purchase freedom, some non-material things are still essential to stay alive such as respect in community and emotional support of loved once.

AI examiner evaluation

Task Achievement / Task Response — Band 6.5

The response addresses both parts of the prompt: how money contributes to happiness and what other factors are important. The ideas are relevant, such as the role of money in providing security and the importance of human connection. However, the development is somewhat uneven. While the first body paragraph provides clear examples like 'gym equipment' and 'protein food', the second paragraph is slightly less focused, jumping between loneliness, career achievement, and social status. The position is clear throughout, but the depth of analysis could be improved by connecting the examples more explicitly to the concept of happiness rather than just general survival or social status.

Coherence and Cohesion — Band 7.0

The essay is logically organized with a clear introduction, two body paragraphs, and a conclusion. Paragraphing is used appropriately to separate the two main themes. Cohesive devices such as 'First and foremost', 'In addition to that', 'Nevertheless', and 'Moreover' are used to guide the reader through the argument. However, there are some instances where the flow is slightly mechanical or the referencing is slightly unclear, such as the transition between 'career achievement' and 'well established behaviour' in the third paragraph. Overall, the progression of ideas is easy to follow.

Lexical Resource — Band 6.0

The range of vocabulary is adequate for the task. You use some good collocations like 'financial stability', 'fundamental needs', and 'peace of mind'. However, there are some inaccuracies in word choice and collocation that prevent a higher score, such as 'selection between choices for leisure time' (which is awkward), 'quality of live' (should be 'life'), and 'loved once' (should be 'loved ones'). While these errors do not impede communication, they indicate a need for more precise control over vocabulary and spelling.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy — Band 6.0

You demonstrate a mix of simple and complex sentence structures. There are several instances of grammatical errors, such as 'having plenty of factors to make people happy' (which is grammatically incomplete), 'they need to struggle to satisfy their wants, if they do not have it' (the 'it' is ambiguous), and 'well established behaviour is the essential part of the life' (missing article). While these errors are frequent, they rarely impede the reader's understanding of your points. To improve, focus on subject-verb agreement and the correct use of articles and pronouns.

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

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