User-written IELTS example
Writing Academic Task 1 Band 9.0 Example
Original task prompt, user essay, band score, and related examples in the same report workspace.
Illustrative target band for this original model answer.
Plan your answer
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Ideas to explore
- The coast grows overall despite a small dip between 1987 and 1992, then finishes with the highest visitor total.
- The lakes show the largest fluctuation: a sharp rise to a 2002 peak followed by a substantial fall.
- The mountains remain the least visited area at the end, but their numbers increase gradually rather than decline.
Suggested structure
- Introduce the graph, its subject, locations and time period.
- Give an overview of the broad trends, the lakes’ peak and the final ranking.
- Describe the coast’s starting point, brief decline and subsequent rise.
- Compare the mountains’ steady increase with the lakes’ rise and later fall.
Useful vocabulary & examples
- rose steadily
- increased gradually over a period
Visitor numbers for the mountains rose steadily from about 20,000 to 35,000.
- peaked at
- reached the highest point
The number of visitors to the lakes peaked at approximately 75,000 in 2002.
- fell to
- decreased and reached a particular level
The lakes’ figure fell to around 50,000 by 2007.
- ended as the most popular destination
- had the highest visitor figure at the end of the period
The coast ended as the most popular destination, at about 75,000 visitors.
Task Prompt

User Essay Analysis
Review the public answer with report-style highlights.
The line graph presents data regarding the number of overseas visitors to three distinct regions – the coast, mountains, and lakes – in a European country over a 20-year period, from 1987 to 2007. Overall, the coast consistently attracted the highest number of visitors throughout the two decades, in contrast to the mountains, which experienced a particularly modest increase. However, this ranking was not uninterrupted: the lakes overtook the coast in 2002, when their figure peaked at approximately 75,000, compared with about 65,000 for the coast.
In 1987, coastal areas received around 40,000 visitors, twice the figure for the mountains (20,000) and four times that for the lakes (10,000). The coastal total dipped slightly to roughly 35,000 in 1992, before rising steadily to about 50,000 in 1997 and 75,000 by 2007. The mountains followed a much flatter course, climbing from 20,000 to 30,000 between 1987 and 1997, remaining level until 2002, and ending at approximately 35,000.
By contrast, lake visits rose rapidly from 10,000 to 40,000 over the first ten years, then surged to a high of around 75,000 in 2002. This was followed by a fall to 50,000 in 2007, leaving the lakes second to the coast at the end of the period.
Targeted Improvement Tips
Related examples for this topic
Compare different bands on the same IELTS prompt.
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