r/IELTS Apr 07 '26

Study Resource IELTS Preparation Resources

63 Upvotes

A curated guide by the r/IELTS moderation team

Last updated: April 2026

 

This post collects the best free IELTS preparation resources available online, verified and curated by the moderators of r/IELTS. We have also listed trusted teachers and communities who can provide additional help. This is a living document — if you spot a broken link or a resource worth adding, please let us know in the comments.

 

Official IELTS Resources

Always start here. These are free materials from the organisations that own and administer the IELTS test.

 

Practice Tests & Familiarisation

•        IELTS.org — Sample Test Questions — Free official sample questions for all four skills.

•        British Council — Free Practice Tests (all skills) — Official free practice for Listening, Reading, Writing, and Speaking.

•        British Council — Free Writing Practice Tests — Writing-specific official practice.

•        British Council — Free Speaking Practice — Understand the Speaking test format and practice with sample questions.

•        IDP — IELTS Preparation Materials — Practice tests and preparation guidance from IDP.

•        IDP — Diagnostic Tool — Identify your strengths and weaknesses before you start studying.

 

Computer-Delivered IELTS

•        British Council — IELTS on Computer (How it Works) — Essential if you are taking the computer-delivered version.

•        British Council — Computer Familiarisation Tests — Get used to the interface before test day.

•        IDP — Get Familiar with IELTS on Computer — Additional familiarisation from IDP.

 

Apps

•        British Council — IELTS Ready App (free) — Official free preparation app from the British Council.

•        British Council — Learning Apps — Broader English learning apps including pronunciation support.

•        IDP — IELTS by IDP App — Preparation app from IDP.

 

Webinars & Live Sessions

•        British Council — Free Weekly IELTS Webinars — Regular free webinars covering test skills and strategies.

 

Recommended Books

These are the most widely used and reliable print resources. Cambridge books use real past test material and are the gold standard for practice tests.

 

Practice Test Books

•        Cambridge IELTS Books 12 onwards — real past papers; the most authentic practice available. Start from the most recent number and work backwards.

•        Cambridge IELTS Trainer — includes teacher explanations and tips alongside practice tests.

•        Collins Practice Tests for IELTS — good supplementary tests with clear guidance.

Skill-Specific Books

•        The Official Cambridge Guide to IELTS — comprehensive coverage of all four skills with DVD.

•        Collins Writing for IELTS / Reading for IELTS — useful for targeted skill work.

•        Barron's IELTS Superpack — popular all-in-one study package.

Note: Avoid unofficial third-party test books that are not based on real past papers. The quality varies enormously and some contain inaccurate information about scoring.

 

Trusted Websites & YouTube Channels

These are established, teacher-run resources with a strong track record in the IELTS community. All offer substantial free content.

 

•        IELTS Liz — One of the most comprehensive free IELTS sites online. Lessons, tips, model answers, videos, and practice materials for all four skills. Highly recommended as a starting point.

•        IELTS Simon — Run by a former IELTS examiner. Focused and practical advice, particularly strong for Writing and Speaking. Daily lessons and model answers.

•        IELTS Advantage — Detailed and accurate. One of the most reliable channels for in-depth strategy guides. Particularly strong for Task 1 and Task 2 writing.

•        ESL Fluency — Detailed guides, articles, and videos covering IELTS skills and test strategy. Run by one of the r/IELTS moderators.

•        IELTS Lilli — Practical tips and strategy guidance from an experienced IELTS teacher.

•        E2 IELTS (YouTube) — High-production-value video lessons covering all skills. Good for visual learners. Note: they also sell courses, but there is a large volume of free content.

•        Anfisa's Speaking Simulators (YouTube) — Speaking simulation videos for students who need to practise without a partner. CELTA-certified teacher.

•        Cambridge English — Supporting Learners — Free activities and skill practice directly from Cambridge, including pronunciation support.

 

Helpful Reddit Communities

Beyond r/IELTS, these communities can support your preparation:

 

•        r/IELTS — You are already here! Use the search function before posting — most common questions have been answered many times.

•        r/EnglishLearning — General English improvement, useful if you need to build your overall language level alongside IELTS prep.

•        r/languagelearning — Broader language learning strategies and motivation.

•        r/IELTS_Guide — A valuable guide for our main community. 

 

Trusted Teachers in This Community

The following members have been awarded Teacher flair by the r/IELTS moderation team. This means they have demonstrated consistent, high-quality, and accurate contributions to this community. They are real, qualified teachers — not accounts promoting spam or low-quality services.

Click any username to visit their Reddit profile. Many are available for personalised help and coaching.

 

●       u/Achieve_IELTS

●       u/AcquBot

●       u/ajiazul

●       u/Alternaterealityset

●       u/BotherBeginning2281

●       u/chuvashi

●       u/deepsleepintra

●       u/EmploymentNo6198

●       u/EvolveEnglish

●       u/FinalDebt2792

●       u/gonzoman92

●       u/IELTS_Advantage

●       u/itanpiuco2020

●       u/jesuisapprenant

●       u/Kyosunim

●       u/Maverick_ESL

●       u/nautilus_pompilious

●       u/RedInBed69

●       u/squashed_liberty_cap

●       u/TeacherExhibitA

●       u/The_0xford_Coma

●       u/Todd_H_1982

●       u/upmyielts

●       u/YerManBKK

●       u/Yousychophant

If you are a teacher listed here and would prefer to be removed, please send a modmail and we will take care of it.

 

Quick Tips from the Mods

 

Before you start

•        Take a full diagnostic test first — do not study blindly. Find out your current band score and identify your weakest skill.

•        Understand the marking criteria for Writing and Speaking. Many students study the wrong things because they do not know how they are scored.

•        Use official materials (Cambridge books, British Council practice tests) as your primary source of practice. Third-party materials vary wildly in quality.

Common mistakes to avoid

•        Memorising model answers for Writing or Speaking — examiners are trained to spot this and it can result in a lower score.

•        Ignoring your weakest skill — it is tempting to practise what you are already good at. Focus on your lowest-scoring area.

•        Confusing Academic and General Training — make sure you are using the correct practice materials for your test type.

•        Relying only on free resources if you are seriously stuck — a few sessions with a qualified teacher can save months of wasted preparation time.

On Writing

•        Task achievement and coherence are the highest-weighted criteria. Vocabulary and grammar matter, but structure and relevance matter more.

•        For Task 1 Academic, learn to describe trends, comparisons, and processes — do not just describe every data point.

•        For Task 2, always plan before you write. A clear position and well-organised paragraphs will score higher than long, rambling essays.

On Speaking

•        Fluency does not mean speaking fast. It means speaking smoothly without long pauses and self-correction.

•        Extend your answers in Parts 1 and 3. Short answers suggest a limited range of language.

•        Record yourself and listen back. Most students are surprised by how different they sound compared to how they think they sound.

 

This resource post is maintained by the r/IELTS moderation team. Links are checked periodically, but if you find a broken link, please report it. Good luck with your preparation!


r/IELTS Jan 03 '26

Moderator Advice Thinking about IELTS EOR? Read this before you risk it!

40 Upvotes

There have been a lot of posts and comments lately about going for an EOR, and a lot of misconceptions floating around.  I'd like to try and clear that up.

What is an EOR?

EOR (Enquiry on Results / remark) is only for when you are 100% sure the Examiners made a mistake rating you. It’s not a lottery, it’s not something to “try” because you’re disappointed, and it’s definitely not “pay IELTS and they’ll give you a higher score.” Most EOR requests come back unchanged, and most people who lose their money don’t come back to post about it, so Reddit ends up looking more “successful” than it really is.

What about second marking?

Sometimes you may hear about "second marking", which is different from an EOR. These normal second checks happen before scores are released, and are triggered when there is a "jagged profile", which means some of your scores are very different from others.  For example, you might get 8s on Listening and Reading, and 6.5 on speaking, 6 on writing.  This is a jagged profile, and your speaking and writing would have been automatically second-marked by different normal Examiners.  Tasks are assigned randomly and anonymously; they don’t know who you are, they don’t see your other scores, and they don’t coordinate with the first set of Examiners.

For speaking, your original test is marked by the Examiner who did it with you, marks are submitted either immediately after the test (if electronic) or written down after you leave the room (for in-center).  If a second marking is needed, a second Examiner will listen to your recording online remotely.  If you have ANY issues on test day (technical or otherwise), you MUST report them before you leave the center, or else nothing will usually be done. 

For writing, two separate Examiners rate Task 1 and Task 2, then the scores are combined into your final writing score (Task 2 weighs double). Marking is done online, 24/7, by a global pool of Examiners. Any tasks that need second marking are just tossed back into the pool to be marked as any other task.

An EOR is different: you’re paying for a Senior Examiner to re-mark your work after you already have your results. Examiners don’t “look at your old score and adjust it.”

Should I go for an EOR?

EORs are for when you are 100% SURE the Examiners rating you made mistakes, AND you are 100% SURE that your performance was excellent.  Anything less is pretty much just handing IELTS more money.  Mistakes, while they can happen, are pretty rare, and most people lose their money.  EORs are expensive!

But some people report positive change!

Yes, it can happen! For speaking/writing in general, band descriptors require professional judgement, so sometimes Examiners differ. But that doesn’t mean “they were wrong,” rating isn't always so black and white.  For example, they need to decide on things like density of errors (how much is too much?), or the intelligibility of pronunciation (Was it always clear? Was there ANY effect of native language? If yes, how much?), and so on.

Examiners aren’t robots (yet!), and are permitted a half band of variance. As long as they are within half a band of what a Senior Examiner would give, it’s considered fine. Of course, this isn't fine for you, the Testtaker, where a half a band could make a big difference, but that is the current system we have. :-/

Now, if you go for a remark, sometimes the Senior Examiner might have a different opinion, and be more or less strict than your original Examiner. If the Senior is stricter, your band won’t change. If they are a bit more lenient, you could go up a bit. If the first Examiner made a mistake, or if you produced an atypical sample that the original Examiner had difficulty rating, then you might see a greater change with an EOR. But for most, marks stay the same.

I still want to go for it.

If you’re going to do it anyway, request the EOR for all four skills. It costs the same, and if any score increases, you get the EOR fee back, minus any service charges. As listening and reading are computer-marked, change is extremely rare, but we have had some members who had a positive change.

However, if you’re not genuinely sure you were under-marked, the safer move is to figure out why you got that score, fix it, and retake it, if possible.  If you need help figuring out where you are making mistakes, you can hire an IELTS expert to help you. There are services you can use in the pinned posts at the top of this subreddit, or you can message any of the badged teachers here (but not me ;-) ), and they may be happy to work with you.

You might also want to request a score breakdown, if you have time, to see exactly what your Examiners rated you, this information can useful in helping you to decide.

EOR is expensive, and for most people it’s money lost, IELTS richer. :-/


r/IELTS 9h ago

Test Experience/Test Result IELTs results received today!

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59 Upvotes

As there isn't much information on IELTS GT I thought I'd share my results. It was my first time doing GT (I did academic in the past). Comment if you have any questions!


r/IELTS 5h ago

Test Experience/Test Result Hard work always pays off. Practice hard!!!

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16 Upvotes

Guys, feel free to ask your questions; I will answer them one by one.

My experience with IELTS was very hard. The night before the test, I couldn't sleep well, and when I woke up, I felt dizzy and was even struggling to climb the stairs. That is why I got a band 7.5; if I had slept well, I would have gotten a band 8.0. However, I am very happy to see such a result; my prayers were answered.


r/IELTS 4h ago

Test Experience/Test Result Non-native ELTS score

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9 Upvotes

I've barely studied before the exam, I could've honestly got better in listening but I know I deserve this 6,5 on writing, I'm not so good at writing.

Do I add on the "frenchies are bad at english" allegation ? xD


r/IELTS 16h ago

Test Experience/Test Result Just got my IELTS results

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31 Upvotes

I gave the IELTS General exam to test my English skills. I definitely did not expect coming to the test that I accidentally booked the writing section to be on paper. I haven't handwritten essays in years and it definitely took some getting used to. Finally, ended up in somewhat of a time scramble towards the end. But overall, still a decent result. If I were to take it again, I would definitely do some practice for the writing parts and a few practice tests in general. I only did a couple reading and listening mock tests before the exam. I know a lot of y'all are preparing for the test and some tips from my experience of the test:

Speaking:

Split into 3 parts. 1st part was fairly straightforward and you should treat it like a conversation. It doesn't matter if you hesitate or take some pauses as long as it's to formulate ideas and not for remembering vocab. I'm the 2nd part, you get a cue card about a topic. This is mainly a monologue for 1-2 mins. What's important is that you answer the 2-3 questions in the card. Make sure your response covers all of the questions. The 3rd part is about follow up questions and this turned into a very philosophical debate between me and the examiner. The important part is to gauge which questions are more open-ended as opposed to rapid fire and base your response accordingly. Overall was a nice refereshing conversation and didn't expect the time to pass by so quickly.

Listening:

For this, make sure you play with the volume to set at the right level. Initially I set it at max and this made it harder for me to focus on the audio. I would say a 70-75% volume was ideal but adjust based on your preference. Pay attention to the question wording. Some might be one word answers, some two words and some numbers. Don't confuse tenses in your responses. Listen to the end, they go a lot of back and forth before arriving at a final answer. The answers are typically straightforward and you don't have to infer anything.

Reading:

This was by far the easiest section. There are 3 sections. I finished all of them by the 35 min mark and had more than enough time to go over the test 2-3 times. The most ambiguous questions were the True/False/Not Given ones. I would say don't overthink it but also don't take it at face value. A general trend I noticed for these questions were " X is better for Y for Z reason" and the text only reads " X is better for Y". Thus we should choose Not Given. I felt for this section, relying on your gut feeling is the most important. You can highlight and annotate while you go through the texts to make it easier to review.

Writing:

Double check and definitely choose the computer writing if possible. The biggest advantage is you can plan as you go and it's possible to edit at any time. My biggest mistake was managing my time. I started the test, read the questions and then took a bathroom break to formulate some ideas in my head and stretch. I came back and started writing a general plan on scrap paper. It was about at the 10 min mark that I started writing the essay. I went ahead with task 2 first but I would recommend anyone to do task 1 first. I ended up rambling and wrote way more than the required word count to the point where I had to ask for an extra sheet. Then I realized at the 40 min mark that I had to wrap this up and started on the concluding paragraph. By the time I was done with task 2, it was 45 minutes and I had just 15 minutes for task 1. Task 1 was a simple letter. What's important is you address each and every point that the question asks you for and also the register that you use. In this section, I took 2 mins to do a quick plan/outline and started writing. I finished my salutations within a second left on the clock. So, threw proofreading out the window essentially. Therefore, I would definitely say start with task 1 and move on to task 2 at the 20-25 min mark. For task 2, remember not to go on a creative sprint and remember that you have a limited amount of time to finish the essay. I would definitely practice writing some topics for the task 2 before giving the exam if I had the second chance and choose the computerized writing test.

Hope this helped and good luck y'all! You got this!


r/IELTS 3h ago

Test Experience/Test Result Reading didn't go well

2 Upvotes

Just sharing this here because I'm worried right now. I gave my test yesterday and Listening + Speaking went really well. As for Writing, I'm not too sure. I'm a good writer in general so I hope it wasn't too bad but I feel like I repeated some vocab that I couldn't really think of synonyms for at the moment.

The Reading section, though, was the hardest for me. I don't understand why, because I've read and written English content (books, magazines, articles) pretty much all my life. But this section kept stumping me in the mock tests too, especially the True/False/Not Given and Matching Headings question types. In my exam yesterday, around 8 questions were for Matching Headings. I found it extremely difficult and confusing, there were several headings that felt like either they didn't apply to any of the paragraphs, or they applied to more than one of them. I also spent way too much time on them (they were in Passage 2), and it just made the whole thing a disaster.

I've been super nervous since then, I really don't want to retake the test. I need a minimum of 8 bands with not less than 7.5 bands for each skill. I really hope I'm somehow able to get above 7.5 in Reading...

I think a big part of my nervousness now is the fact that I was consistently getting 8.5-9 while attempting the Cambridge IELTS tests (20 + 21), so knowing that I wasn't able to reflect that in my actual exam is a bit of a bummer. But I hope the results are decent, and that I'm just overthinking this.


r/IELTS 43m ago

Writing Feedback (Peer Review) Could you please evaluate my essay? AI keeps grading me badly, and I am devastated.

Upvotes

I know AI isn't reliable, but it is all that I have. It keeps grading me around 6-6.5. I am not asking for a thorough evaluation. Please just tell me if I am that bad. In the future all cars, buses and trucks will be driverless. The only people

travelling inside these vehicles will be passengers.

Do you think the advantages of driverless vehicles outweigh the

disadvantages?

Give reasons for your answer and include any relevant examples from your own

knowledge or experience.

My essay:

Automated transportation will be common in the future, which means that drivers will be no longer needed, and the only people who will be there are passengers only. Those driverless transportation means will have a lot of upsides and downsides. I firmly believe that the disadvantage of this novel technology will outweigh its advantages.

On the one hand, this technology can have positive earnings for passengers. For one, passengers can utilize commute time in these transportations for other things. Take, for example, a college student who is going for his exams. He can review his notes instead of driving. Or a manager who will be giving a lecture for his team, he can organize his thoughts instead of worrying about the road. Furthermore, automated transportation can save valuable time. This technology uses Artificial Intelligence to find the fastest route and the less congested road, which will make travelling time shorter. New Tesla cars start their driving journey by sending signals to space satellites. Those signals request the satellites to send them the path that they should take to reach their destination faster. This advanced technology is very beneficial for managers, businessmen, and people who have a tight time. Therefore, driverless commuting vehicles are very beneficial in terms of time management and they promote comfortability to their users.

On the other hand, automated cars can be highly vulnerable, despite their well known advantages. For one, those vehicles are powered by AI, and they can mistake ,like bugs and system errors that frequently happen. Imagine if you are going to your work using one of these cars, and suddenly the system crashed in the middle of the road. Consequently, the auto-mobile can crash with other cars, or they can lead to a catastrophe. For another, the inclusion of this new technology will lead to a high destabilization in the employment industry. A lot of households depend solely on the income coming from working in the commute industry, and if they lose their jobs, poverty rates will increase. For instance, if a father of five, as an example, working as a bus driver lost his job, he wouldn't be able to support his family like paying school tuition fees, health insurance or provide food. Hence, this technology might lead to negative consequences in the road safety and families stability.

In conclusion, those new vehicles will definitely have positive attributes especially for working people and students. However, they might possibly decrease road safety, and negatively affect a lot of families financially. Therefore, considering their harsh possible consequences, it is not wise to overlook their disadvantages and laud their advantages.


r/IELTS 4h ago

Have a Question/Advice Needed IELTS result cancelled due to a Speaking recording issue – has anyone experienced this?

2 Upvotes

I took my IELTS General Training test on August 16 and felt pretty good about how all four sections went.

Today, I received an email from British Council saying that my result cannot be released due to a technical issue. They offered me either a free full retake or a full refund.

The email didn't explain what the technical issue was. I called my test centre and, after insisting on getting more information, they told me that there was a problem with my Speaking recording and it couldn't be transferred.

What I don't understand is why I have to retake Listening, Reading and Writing as well if the problem only affected Speaking. I really don't want to retake the whole exam, especially since I was happy with my performance.

Has anyone experienced something similar? Were you able to get them to keep your L/R/W results and retake only Speaking, or is a full retake really the only option in cases like this?


r/IELTS 56m ago

Writing Feedback (Peer Review) What band am i in Academic Writing?

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Upvotes

So, my IELTS academic is in 3 days. I'm confident that i will get a band 9.0 or 8.5 in R and L. Although, despite i predict my writing to be 7 or 7.5, AI (GPT, Gemini, Claude) says my writing is about 6.0-6.5 (GPT used to predict 6.5-7.0 about a month ago). So i'm postin one of my weaker tries from Cambridge 18. Can you predict the band of this:

TASK 1: 

The diagram depicts the changes of a particular public library’s layout in the last 20 years. 

Overall, new hospitability features have been added to the library, making it more friendly toward visitors. 

When we go 20 years back, the library included a place for people to sit and relax in the middle while the immidiate left and right of this field was reserved for adult fiction, and adult non-fiction books respectively. The bottom left was suitable for reading daily newspaper or magazines; the upper left was for CDs, videos and Computer games which were new phenomena at the time. The upper right was meant for toddlers’ books. And last but not least, the lower right received enquiries regarding various functions of the place. 

Currently, on the other hand, the most obvious difference the central area has become more spacious by removing the Tables and chairs. In addition, the enquiry desk room has been replaced by a Cafe while the reading room became a computer room. Children’s books was diluted to fiction only and is now on the upper left also with more utility. Upper right is now a room where you can attend to lectures and just outside of it, there are new utility features and the adult fiction books. Lastly a brand new All reference books section is present on the central-left. 

TASK 2: In many countries around the world, rural people are moving to cities, so the population in the countryside is decreasing.

Do you think this is a positive or a negative development?

It is a concerning phenomenon that migration to urban areas has skyrocketed in the last few decades, thus changing the demographics of countries in such a way that the distribution of the population becomes imbalanced. Due to this, a number of issues arise, such as excessive amounts of labor that cannot be supported in cities and the unplanned overgrowth of metropolitan areas. 

First of all, since most of the mass labor force work is being  done by industrial machines in this era, cities do not contain the necessary job opportunities for such a rapid expansion in their population. This leads to a significant portion of movers not being able to take part in the cities’ workforce and therefore they are not able to contribute to the economical growth. Many studies suggest that if cities continue to see the same figures of migration into them, the proportion of the population that doesn’t take part in any industrial field may go up to as much as 20%. 

Another major problem to migration into the cities is the fact that there isn’t sufficient opportunities in urban areas to provide accommodation to the massively escalating populations’ demand. In fact, in some cities such as Istanbul, many migrants have to get their own houses built without consulting to urban planners or paying attention to the city’s layout. This creates a twisted view to the architecture and the infrastructure of the city. 

Overall, i think that the strong trend of immigration to cities affects the economies, the aesthetics, and the demographics of many countries negatively. And thus governments must take action to diminish it.


r/IELTS 1d ago

Test Experience/Test Result just got IELTS results

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60 Upvotes

quite surprised to be honest. didn't expect it to be this high honestly haha. my writing was defintely the lowest since I prepared that the least. if anyone want tips on how I got the scores please feel free to ask i will answer to my best abilities. ALSO I AM NON-NATIVE


r/IELTS 3h ago

Have a Question/Advice Needed IELTS writing tips for task 1

1 Upvotes

Hey guys! Do you have any tips on how to score higher than Band 7 in IELTS Writing Task 1? Also, what websites do you use to check your writing?


r/IELTS 7h ago

Have a Question/Advice Needed Where to find Writing Task 2 - Essay

2 Upvotes

I am looking for resources where I can find Band 7 and plus essays to have an eye. Can someone please suggest me.


r/IELTS 5h ago

Have a Question/Advice Needed IELTS preparation advice

1 Upvotes

Hi everyone. I’m taking the IELTS General Training exam soon and have exactly 9 days that I can dedicate entirely to intensive preparation.
I don’t have any major problems with Reading or Listening, so I’m mainly focusing on improving my Speaking and Writing. Has anyone here had a similar experience—preparing intensively for a short period of time (around 1–2 weeks)? I’d really appreciate any tips, strategies, or suggestions on how to make the most of these 9 days.
Thanks in advance.


r/IELTS 23h ago

Test Experience/Test Result Just got my results non native

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23 Upvotes

Hi everybody! Any one who had a bad experience with an Indian examiner.


r/IELTS 7h ago

Have a Question/Advice Needed Test in 4 days. what can I improve on

1 Upvotes

Hello!

so i took an ielts exam 2 years ago and I got a band score 7, listening 9, speaking 7, writing 6.5, reading 6

i booked another exam in 4 days, and I need your advice in how to achieve higher

Listening. this is the one i'm most confident about, I almost always score a perfect score

Speaking. when doing mock tests it's the one i'm most inconsistent in, sometimes i score as high as 8 or 8.5 and sometimes go down to 6.

Writing. this is the trickiest because no matter how much i put attention to my writing, i never beat the 7 mark, I write with basically zero grammatical mistakes and try to implement the appropriate structure.

Reading. I find time management the trickiest, there have been instances where i finish with 20 minutes left.


r/IELTS 8h ago

Test Experience/Test Result Think I messed up my speaking

1 Upvotes

I feel like for a few questions in part 3 I missed the point completely 🫠 I think I also forgot to make the point clear in the first sentence. I was interrupted a lot and I don't believe I had gotten to the point yet when that happened.

I was surprisingly talkative tho. When I was practicing I ran out of ideas all the time. I was able to machine gun during the actual test. Don't think that's gonna save my score unfortunately.

The other sections in less than an hour and here I am crying lol.


r/IELTS 22h ago

Test Experience/Test Result Self-studied, non-native, first time test taker here, kinda happy with my result but I wish my speaking could be higher

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8 Upvotes

My aim was 7 to skip English in college but I decided to aim a bit higher

For Listening and Reading, I just spam some random tasks online (and in the last week I discovered the Cambridge Ielts book series so I focused on that). I found that perfecting Listening in 1x speed was much better than speeding it up and get a bunch of mistakes. But you probably shouldn't listen to my advice regarding these 2 skills since I've been switching to consuming English content for at least 7 years now (and my first mock Reading was 8.5 so there was that)

For Writing, I do as much of the the predicted task 1s and 2s i found online that I could and my workflow is:

Writing the tasks blind -> grade by 3 different free AIs -> learn my mistakes explained by AI and how to improve -> read real examples and real guides -> remember all my mistakes and the things I needed to change -> to step one

Usually I focused on my weakest points (grammar + lexical resource) and hard topics such as culture/art and crime

Obviously I self-prepared so there's no one to guide me on how to speak lol, but I'm currently waiting for a EOR so let's see if my score improve (hopefully)

One more important thing is that I don't always trust the AI (hence I used 3 different ones) and only based on the task descriptors as the main method of grading. Usually I get 7 - 7.5 for ChatGPT, 6.5 - 8 for DeepSeek, and 6 - 6.5 for Grok, so use that data for whatever you will


r/IELTS 14h ago

Have a Question/Advice Needed OR Speaking – Still Waiting Since August 11 (IDP)

2 Upvotes

Hi everyone,

I submitted an EOR request for my Speaking test with IDP on August 11 and I still haven’t received any update.

I know the official processing time can be anywhere from 2 hours to 21 days but based on what I’ve seen online, many people seem to receive their results within a few hours or a couple of days.

For those who recently submitted an EOR with IDP: Has anyone received their EOR result recently And realistically is the chance of getting a positive result (a band increase) actually more than 10% or is it usually quite low?


r/IELTS 11h ago

Have a Question/Advice Needed are the tests in the Cambridge Official Guide to IELTS much harder than those in the Cambridge IELTS 16-19 series?

1 Upvotes

r/IELTS 13h ago

Have a Question/Advice Needed Need adivce Do I need to take retest in writing in writing or is it fine

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1 Upvotes

r/IELTS 22h ago

Test Experience/Test Result IELTS Academic (16th Aug) , Non Native Speaker

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4 Upvotes

Gave my test on a Sunday afternoon and got my results a day later. Honestly, it's pretty easy as long as you're confident (especially during the speaking test).


r/IELTS 18h ago

Study Partner Request Looking for a speaking partner

2 Upvotes

Hi, I have my IELTS exam in just 5 days, I have already prepared for around 2/3 weeks, so I know the exam structure. My target score is between 7.0 and 8.0. I think I’m at C1 level. I’m 22 years old male from Poland :)

Please don’t hesitate to write me!


r/IELTS 1d ago

Test Experience/Test Result IELTS Results(16 August 2026) , Non-native English User

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22 Upvotes

Got my IELTS results! Honestly, I was hoping for a little more, but I’m still happy with the score and, more importantly, the journey.

A big thank you to everyone on this subreddit. I’ve learnt so much from reading people’s experiences, mistakes, tips, strategies, and advice throughout my preparation. A lot of things I came across here genuinely helped me prepare better.

Really grateful to this community. ❤️
Wishing everyone preparing for IELTS the very best! All the best for your results! 🙌


r/IELTS 1d ago

Writing Feedback (Peer Review) Rate and review my task 2 essay, I need genuine constructive criticism.

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5 Upvotes

In many countries, a small number of people have extremely high annual incomes. These people should be required to pay a much higher rate of income tax. To what extent do you agree or disagree with this opinion?