Overview of the IELTS Test
Start your IELTS preparation here with an overview of each part of the test: listening, reading, writing and speaking.
by Tim Martyn
Listening
Here are some key points about listening in the IELTS test:
- There are 4 parts with a total of 40 questions.
- Each part has 10 questions.
- The listening section takes approximately 30 minutes in total.
- You hear each listening passage once only.
- Each question is worth 1 mark.
Here’s an overview of the 4 parts.
Part | |
---|---|
1 | a conversation between two speakers in an everyday social context (e.g. asking for information about a gym membership) |
2 | a monologue in an everyday social context (e.g. speech about school facilities) |
3 | a conversation between up to four speakers in an academic context (e.g. a student asking a tutor about an assignment) |
4 | a monologue in an academic context (e.g. a university lecture) |
A variety of question types are used.
Listening question types |
---|
Multiple choice |
Matching |
Plan labelling |
Map labelling |
Diagram labelling |
Form completion |
Note completion |
Table completion |
Flow-chart completion |
Summary completion |
Sentence completion |
Short-answer questions |
Reading
Here are some key points about reading in the IELTS test:
- There are 3 reading passages with a total of 40 questions.
- Each passage has 12–14 questions.
- The passages gradually become more difficult. That is, READING PASSAGE 1 is the easiest and READING PASSAGE 3 is the most difficult.
- The reading section takes 60 minutes in total.
- Each question is worth one mark.
- The passages are taken from books, journals, magazines and newspapers. They’re authentic and academic but written for a non-specialist audience.
- The style of the passages may be narrative, descriptive or argumentative. At least one of the passages will contain detailed logical argument.
- If a passage contains technical terms that need to be understood in order to answer a question, a simple glossary is provided.
A variety of question types are used.
Reading question types |
---|
Multiple choice |
True / False / Not Given |
Yes / No / Not Given |
Matching information |
Matching headings |
Matching features |
Matching sentence endings |
Sentence completion |
Summary completion |
Note completion |
Table completion |
Flow-chart completion |
Diagram label completion |
Short-answer questions |
Writing
Here are some key points about writing in the IELTS test:
- There are 2 tasks.
- Certified human raters score your responses.
- You have 60 minutes to complete the writing tasks.
Here’s an overview of Task 1.
Writing time | Length | What you need to do |
---|---|---|
About 20 minutes | At least 150 words | Describe and summarise visual information in the form of a bar chart, diagram, line graph, map, pie chart or table, or any combination of these |
Assessment criteria:
- Task achievement
- Coherence and cohesion
- Lexical resource
- Grammatical range and accuracy
Here’s an overview of Task 2.
Writing time | Length | What you need to do |
---|---|---|
About 40 minutes | At least 250 words | Write an essay in response to a point of view, argument or problem. Discussion, opinion, advantages–disadvantages and two-part essay questions are all common. |
Assessment criteria:
- Task response
- Coherence and cohesion
- Lexical resource
- Grammatical range and accuracy
Speaking
Here are some key points about speaking in the IELTS test:
- It’s conducted face-to-face with a human examiner.
- There are 3 parts.
- The speaking test takes 11–14 minutes in total.
- It’s recorded.
Here’s an overview of the various parts.
Timing | What you need to do | |
---|---|---|
Part 1 | 4–5 minutes | Answer questions about familiar topics such as home, family and work |
Part 2 | 3–4 minutes | Speak for 1–2 minutes in response to a task card (following 1 minute of preparation time) |
Part 3 | 4–5 minutes | Answer more detailed and abstract questions about the topic from Part 2 |
Assessment criteria:
- Fluency and coherence
- Lexical resource
- Grammatical range and accuracy
- Pronunciation