Pick out the main features of this bar chart for your overview, write your report on a 20-minute timer, then compare it with a band-8 model answer.
You should spend about 20 minutes on this task.
The chart below shows the monthly sales of ice cream and hot drinks in one café over six months.
Summarise the information by selecting and reporting the main features, and make comparisons where relevant.
Write at least 150 words.
| Category | Ice cream | Hot drinks |
|---|---|---|
| Apr | 4 | 14 |
| May | 7 | 11 |
| Jun | 12 | 8 |
| Jul | 16 | 5 |
| Aug | 15 | 5 |
| Sep | 8 | 10 |
GoPrep wrote this practice question in the style of the exam. It is not an official IELTS question.
An overview names the main trends or differences in one or two sentences, without numbers. These are the features a strong answer picks out:
Spend the first few minutes planning, then write.
0 words of 150 minimum
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Write your own answer first, then compare: how it answers the exact question, what each paragraph does, and which phrases you could borrow.
The bar chart shows monthly sales of ice cream and hot drinks in one café from April to September, in thousands of dollars.
Overall, ice cream sales rose to a summer peak and then fell, while hot drink sales followed the opposite pattern, reaching their lowest point in the middle of the period. The two products swapped positions as the weather warmed up.
In April hot drinks were far more popular, with sales of $14,000 against only $4,000 for ice cream. Over the next two months ice cream sales rose to $7,000 in May and $12,000 in June, whereas hot drink sales decreased to $11,000 and $8,000. The two lines therefore crossed between May and June.
Ice cream sales peaked at $16,000 in July and remained high at $15,000 in August, before dropping to $8,000 in September. Hot drinks were at their lowest in July and August, with sales of just $5,000 in both months, and then recovered to $10,000 in September. By the end of the period, the two products were therefore close to the positions they held in May.
| Phrase | Meaning |
|---|---|
| monthly sales | amount sold each month |
| peak in July | reach the highest in July |
| bottom out | reach the lowest point |
| seasonal demand | demand that depends on the time of year |
| reverse | change direction |
| the better seller | the product sold more |
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