IELTS Writing Task 1 Academic: describing graphs, tables, processes and maps (2026)

Academic Writing Task 1 gives you visual data (a graph, table, chart, process or map) and asks you to describe it in at least 150 words. It is not an essay, it is a report: no opinion, no reasons, only what is shown. Marks are lost for two main reasons: no overview, and listing every figure one after another. This guide gives a structure that fits in 20 minutes, the rules for each task type and the language that works.

Weight first: Task 1 is a third

Task 2 carries twice the weight in the Writing band, so Task 1 is roughly a third of the score. The practical consequence: split the 60 minutes as 20 + 40, write 160 to 190 words in Task 1 and spend no more time on it. A 7 in Task 1 needs a complete and accurate report, not beautiful language.

The four-paragraph structure

1. Introduction (1 sentence). The task statement in your own words: "The bar chart compares" instead of "The chart shows", "how many" instead of "the number of". Do not copy the prompt: copied words are not counted.
2. Overview (2 sentences). The most important paragraph. At least two key features: the overall trend, the largest and the smallest, the sharpest change. No figures. Put the overview second, not hidden at the end.
3. Detail 1 and Detail 2. Group the data (the risers together, the fallers together; the first period and the last) and support each group with figures. Not every figure, the key ones.

No conclusion is needed; the overview does that job.

Each task type has its own rule

A process has no figures: say in the overview how many stages there are and where it begins and ends, then walk through the stages in the passive with sequencing words. A map compares two periods: what did not change must be mentioned too, because that is data as well.

Tense and grammar

• Past years → past tense: "In 2010 the figure stood at 40%."
• A forecast → will / is expected to / is projected to.
• No period (a process, a general table) → present tense.
• Comparison structures: "three times as high as", "the second largest", "slightly lower than".
• Be able to express change as a verb and as a noun: "sales rose sharply" = "there was a sharp rise in sales". Alternating between them earns Grammatical Range.

Typical mistakes of AZ and RU speakers

• Articles: "the number of students", "the proportion of women". "Number of students increased" is wrong.
• increase in / rise in, not "increase of" (that form takes a quantity: "an increase of 5%").
• percent and percentage: "40 percent" (with a figure), "the percentage of" (without one).
• amount / number: "number" for countables (number of cars), "amount" for uncountables (amount of energy).
• rise / raise: "prices rose", "the company raised prices".
• Reasons: "because people prefer…" does not belong in a report. The chart does not show causes.

The 20-minute plan

• 2 minutes: what is shown, over which period, in which unit (percent? millions?), the two biggest features.
• 15 minutes: introduction, overview, two detail paragraphs.
• 3 minutes: articles, tenses, figures copied correctly, word count.

Next step

To see which criterion your Task 1 score is leaking from, read the Writing band descriptors guide. Check the report's length with the word counter. If you sit General Training, Task 1 is a letter: the Task 1 General letter guide has its separate rules. For the essay that carries two thirds of the band, there is the Writing Task 2 strategy.