How IELTS Writing Task 2 is marked
Examiners score every essay on four criteria, each worth a quarter of the mark: Task Response (did you answer every part of the question with a clear, developed position?), Coherence and Cohesion (is it logically organised into paragraphs with natural linking?), Lexical Resource (range and precision of vocabulary) and Grammatical Range and Accuracy. The four scores are averaged to give your Task 2 band, and Task 2 counts for twice as much as Task 1 in your final Writing score.
Reading your result
- The overall band is the average of the four criteria, rounded to the nearest half band, the way IELTS reports it.
- Each criterion comes with a short reason, quoting your essay where it helps, so you can see exactly what pulled the score up or down.
- “Fix these first” lists the three changes with the biggest effect — work on those before polishing anything else.
Five habits that raise Writing bands
- Spend three to five minutes planning: decide your position and the one main idea for each body paragraph.
- Answer every part of the question — a two-part question needs two clear answers.
- Develop each idea with an explanation and a specific example, not a list of points.
- Write at least 250 words; under-length essays lose marks in Task Response.
- Save two minutes to proofread for articles, plurals and verb tenses — the most common errors at Band 6.
Short of ideas? Plan an essay with the Task 2 essay ideas generator, then check the length with the IELTS word counter.