Pick out the main features of this table 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 table below shows the weekly cost of food, transport and leisure for four household types.
Summarise the information by selecting and reporting the main features, and make comparisons where relevant.
Write at least 150 words.
| Household | Food | Transport | Leisure |
|---|---|---|---|
| Single adult | 65 | 30 | 40 |
| Couple | 110 | 55 | 70 |
| Family with children | 190 | 80 | 60 |
| Retired couple | 95 | 18 | 35 |
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
Your answer stays on this page only. Copy it before you leave.
Write your own answer first, then compare: how it answers the exact question, what each paragraph does, and which phrases you could borrow.
The table shows the weekly cost of food, transport and leisure for four types of household, in dollars.
Overall, food was the largest expense for every type of household, and families with children spent the most overall. Retired couples spent the least on transport and leisure.
A family with children spent $190 a week on food, the highest figure in the table, and $80 on transport. Its leisure spending of $60 was lower than that of a couple, at $70. Couples spent $110 on food and $55 on transport.
A single adult had lower costs, spending $65 on food, $30 on transport and $40 on leisure. This meant that the single adult spent less than a couple in all three categories, though by considerably different margins.
The retired couple spent $95 a week on food, slightly less than the working couple, and its leisure budget was just $35, the lowest on the table. It also spent only $18 on transport, which was the lowest amount of all and less than a quarter of the figure for families with children.
| Phrase | Meaning |
|---|---|
| weekly spending | money spent each week |
| household type | kind of family unit |
| spend the most on | have the highest cost for |
| nearly three times | almost triple |
| the lowest of all | less than any other |
| retired couple | older people not working |
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