IELTS Speaking Part 1 and Part 3: question types and answer length (2026)

Of the three parts of Speaking, Part 2 gets the most attention, but marks go missing in Part 1 and Part 3: in one the answers are too short, in the other the candidate falls silent for want of an opinion or the words for it. This guide covers the question types of both parts, the right answer length and the language formulas that work. Part 2 has its own cue-card method guide.

Speaking at a glance

Eleven to fourteen minutes in total. The examiner is a live person (face to face, or by video call at some centres) marking four criteria: Fluency & Coherence, Lexical Resource, Grammatical Range & Accuracy, Pronunciation.

Part 1: short, but never one word

The questions are about you, and because you know the answer the risk is ending on "yes". The formula: answer + reason or example, two or three sentences.

• Do you like your hometown? → "I do, mostly because it's by the sea, so summer evenings are spent on the boulevard. The traffic, though, is a different story."
• How often do you use public transport? → "Almost every day. The metro is the only way to get to work on time, even if it's packed in the morning."

Typical question types: preference (do you prefer…), frequency (how often…), comparison with the past (did you … when you were a child?), the future (will you… in the future?). Each type has its own grammar, so use it: answer a past question in the past tense and a future one with "I'm planning to / I'd like to". That shows Grammatical Range without forcing it.

A memorised opener in Part 1 ("That's a very interesting question") is the worst choice: the examiner has heard it hundreds of times and it lowers Fluency.

Part 3: opinion, reason, example, the other side

Part 3 questions are abstract and about "people" and "society" rather than "you": Why do some people prefer to live in cities? How might work change in the next twenty years? The answer is four to six sentences, and the formula changes:

1. Opinion ("I'd say the main reason is…")
2. Reason ("because…")
3. Example ("In Baku, for instance,…")
4. The other side or a condition ("That said, older people often…")

Part 3 question types and the language that works:

If you have no opinion, you still have language: "I've never really thought about it, but I suppose…" is entirely acceptable. The examiner is not testing whether the opinion is right, only your ability to express one.

What a 7 needs

Band 7 Fluency & Coherence means speaking at length without noticeable effort, with hesitation that is about content rather than about finding words. Lexical Resource means flexible and precise word choice, some less common items, collocation. In practice: extend every Part 1 answer with a reason, attach an example to every Part 3 opinion, and do not be afraid to correct yourself ("what I mean is…").

Frequent mistakes of AZ and RU speakers

• Articles: "I live in city", "I work in bank". Watch the articles when rehearsing answers aloud.
• He/she mix-ups (AZ speakers, whose "o" covers both): "My sister… he"; slow, conscious practice fixes it, and Part 1 family questions bring it out.
• Tense mismatch: "When I was child I am playing football." A past question takes a past-tense answer.
• Translated idioms and false friends: "I am boring in the evening" for "bored"; "sympathetic" for "nice"; "actual" for "current".
• Pronunciation: the "th" sounds (think, this), "w" against "v", and word stress in long words (de-VE-lop-ment, not DE-ve-lop-ment).

Next step

For Part 2 there is the cue-card method. What the examiner counts on the four criteria is opened up in the Speaking band descriptors guide. Practise with cards and questions in the Speaking cards tool; the full list of first-language mistakes is in common English mistakes by AZ speakers.