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 percentage of internet users in four age groups who carry out five online activities.
Summarise the information by selecting and reporting the main features, and make comparisons where relevant.
Write at least 150 words.
| Activity | 16–24 | 25–34 | 35–54 | 55+ |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 88 | 95 | 96 | 90 | |
| Banking | 52 | 81 | 84 | 63 |
| Shopping | 70 | 85 | 80 | 52 |
| Streaming | 94 | 90 | 72 | 41 |
| Job search | 45 | 40 | 18 | 3 |
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 percentage of internet users in four age groups who carried out five online activities.
Overall, email was the most universal activity, whereas streaming and job searching varied most by age. Streaming and job search were most popular among the youngest users, while banking and shopping peaked among the middle-aged.
Email was used by a high proportion of every group, from 88% of 16–24-year-olds to 96% of those aged 35–54, and 90% of those aged 55 and over. Banking was far less popular among the youngest, at 52%, but reached 81% in the 25–34 group and 84% among those aged 35–54, before falling to 63% for the oldest users.
Shopping followed a similar pattern, with the highest rate of 85% in the 25–34 group and the lowest of 52% for people aged 55 and over.
Streaming declined steadily with age, from 94% of 16–24-year-olds to 41% of the oldest group. Job searching was the least common activity overall, falling from 45% among the youngest to a mere 3% among those aged 55 and over, a fifteenfold difference.
| Phrase | Meaning |
|---|---|
| online activities | things done on the internet |
| job search | looking for work |
| streaming | watching online |
| be most popular among | be favoured by |
| decline sharply | fall quickly |
| the older generation | older people |
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