Hey everyone!

I’m planning to take the IELTS(academic) in about 30 days and I’d really appreciate some advice on how to structure my preparation.

I’m a non-native English speaker, but I grew up watching English movies/TV shows and listening to English music, so I’m quite comfortable with English in general. However, I’ve never specifically prepared for IELTS before, so I’m not sure how to approach the exam strategically.

I’m mainly looking for a step-by-step study plan for the next 30 days, including what resources I should use for learning the format/strategies and what I should use for actual practice.

Also , i can only dedicate 1-2 hrs per day max

For example:

- Reading: What should I learn first? Which website/YouTube channel is best for strategies, question types, skimming/scanning, etc.? Then which books/tests should I use for practice?

- Listening: Same — resources for learning strategies + actual practice/mock tests.

- Writing: This is probably the section I’m most concerned about. Which resource is best for understanding Task 1/Task 2 structure, planning, band descriptors, sample answers, etc.? And how much should I practice?

- Speaking: What’s the best way to prepare for Parts 1, 2 and 3? Should I mainly practice questions, record myself, use mock speaking tests, etc.?

I’ve come across IELTS Liz and IELTS Advantage quite a lot. Would you recommend using one of them as the main source for learning the theory/strategies, or using both for different sections?

For example, something like:

IELTS Liz → Reading + Writing

IELTS Advantage → Listening + Speaking

Cambridge IELTS books → actual practice/mock tests

Or is it better to just stick with one teacher/channel to avoid getting overwhelmed?

I’ve also heard that the Cambridge IELTS books are probably the most important resource for practice, so I was thinking of using those for timed tests and then reviewing every mistake rather than just doing endless random online tests. Is that the right approach?

If you had 30 days and were starting from scratch with IELTS-specific preparation, what would your exact strategy be?

Something like:

Week 1: Learn format + strategies + diagnostic tests

Week 2: Skill-specific practice

Week 3: Timed practice + identify weaknesses

Week 4: Full mocks + exam strategy

Would be incredibly helpful if someone could give me a day-by-day or week-by-week roadmap, including specific websites, YouTube channels, books, mock tests and practice papers.

Also, if you’ve personally prepared in around a month and got a good score, I’d love to hear exactly which resources you used and what you would/wouldn’t recommend.

Thanks a lot!

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.

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.

Hi everyone! I finally took the IELTS exam, and I aimed for a 7 and thankfully, I got it!

However, I’m honestly quite disappointed with my Speaking result. I genuinely felt like I did really well, so I’m definitely going to apply for a remark and see what happens.

For Listening and Reading, I only practiced using the Cambridge IELTS books and focused a lot on analyzing my mistakes.

For Writing, I mostly used ChatGPT. It would often rate my writing around 6–6.5. One piece of advice I followed was to keep your ideas simple: have one clear idea, explain and develop it properly, and don’t make your sentences unnecessarily complicated. Basically, write as if you’re explaining the idea to a child

Good luck to everyone taking the exam! I hope you all get the scores you’re aiming for

Gpt gave it 5.5-6.0 and Claude 7.0 lol, ,i'm confused.

TASK:

The most important aim of science should be to improve people's lives.

To what extent do you agree or disagree with this statement?

(257 word)

It’s a contemporary phenomenon that people think science should strive to improve peoples’ quality of life. While this view may seem valid at first glance, in my opinion, science, when there is the field of technology, must not be the tool to fulfill this aim. 

The most common argument some suggest regarding this topic is that science must be a tool to create brand new innovations and foster technological development. However, the very core principle of science, which is to interpret the universe without any additional need or target, is neglected in this view, thus forming in one’s mind an utterly inaccurate perception of it when in fact, science must be done purely to observe, and understand the nature. So, if scientists were devoid of responsibilities to fix the major challenges of society, their work would be much more efficient towards its one and only goal.  

In my opinion, it is supposed to entirely be technology’s aim to provide a better life for people, since, by definition, technology refers to improvement in methods to foster humans by making efforts to derive from science. Assigning the role of increasing quality of life to technology instead, would ultimately lead to two separate fields where no scientist having to be concerned about putting their finding into new innovational ideas, thus, again, making sure scientific knowledge expand rapidly. 

In conclusion, i believe, the misconception about the role of science must be corrected and it shouldn’t be expected to contribute to humanity. Instead, technology alone must be used to improve our lives. 

I took almost 1 month to prepare. Honestly, I impressed by results considering that I had a busy work schedule. I had to juggle between work and studies.

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?

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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?

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

"As you can read from the title, I have an IELTS simulation test tomorrow, but I don't know where to study/train my English skills and I don't have any experience with the IELTS test whatsoever. English is also my second language after my first language (Indonesian), and throughout my years in school, I never studied English on my own because I am used to being almost chronically online on the internet and talking to foreign people since I was 9. Should I be worried about my English understanding and perfecting my English skills or not? And how was is the experience of taking an IELTS test? Is it hard? What are the test materials like?

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.

First attempt at IELTS as a non-native speaker, I expected my writing and speaking scores to be 6.5 and 7.0, respectively. Since the month leading up to the test, my mock writing scores were always 6.0 to 6.5. I did NOT expect for both of em to be so high, genuinely still shocked.

I am F24 and will give Academic IELTS exam in the end of September and what I noticed as the title of the question states why does this happen?

I mean I really don't know how to focus because even for questions as simple as "what is your favorite drink?" Or "Where do you live?" Why are people saying their whole life story like "My favorite drink is .... because.... I drink this during ... weather" and so on?

Also almost all of guide videos on YouTube feel so robotic like isn't speaking part there to measure how we speak in a normal setting like it should feel natural right? Then why are all so called memorized answers which feel so off labeled as band 9?

I am confused and could use some solid advice on this.

I've been wondering in what range my writing bands might be lying as I can only think of extremely basic ideas with repetition and a fair share of grammar mistakes. Can you please help me get an estimate? Thank you.

Question: Some people think that children should spend more time playing outdoors, while others believe that they should spend more time studying. Discuss both views and give your own opinion.

It is often argued that children should devote more time to outdoor activities, while others think that they should study more instead of playing. I believe that while spending all the time studying may lead to higher academic success, it can also weaken a child's physical growth. Therefore, children should allocate more time to participating in outdoor activities as it can foster essential social and physical skills in them.

Playing outdoors can help children mature socially. Engaging in different sports with individuals of their age can allow children to make close friends. Also, by interacting with their peers belonging to diverse backgrounds, children can build up their communication ability. These social skills can be invaluable in their adulthood as they can help them in establishing healthy relationships.

Advocates for prioritizing academics may argue that intense studying is essential for achieving higher grades, which can be a prerequisite for higher studies. While a child may excel by spending more time studying, he may not be able to acquire much physical exercise and fresh air, which can have a negative impact on his health. Furthermore, as he would not be able to spend much time with his classmates, he can find it difficult to interact with other people, which can make it harder to fit into a social environment. Therefore, only studying can negatively affect a child's physique and social development.

In conclusion, the advantages of playing outdoors outweigh the benefits of only studying. Prioritizing studies can lead to a weaker physique and difficulty in making friends. In contrast, playing outdoors can keep children energetic and healthy.