Students treat the IELTS band as a single mysterious verdict. It is not. It is an average of four numbers, each produced by a published set of criteria, and the rounding rule at the end decides a surprising number of applications.
Knowing the arithmetic tells you exactly where the cheapest half-band is available. That is worth more than another month of general practice.
How each skill is scored
Listening and Reading: raw marks
Forty questions each, converted to a band by a published table. There is no examiner judgement. Reading Academic is marked more strictly than General Training, because the passages are harder. A single extra correct answer can move you a half band near the boundaries.
Writing: four criteria, equally weighted
Task Achievement (did you answer the actual question), Coherence and Cohesion (structure and linking), Lexical Resource (vocabulary), Grammatical Range and Accuracy. Task 2 carries twice the weight of Task 1. Students routinely spend equal time on both and lose marks for it.
Speaking: four criteria
Fluency and Coherence, Lexical Resource, Grammatical Range and Accuracy, Pronunciation. Note that three of the four have nothing to do with accent. Pronunciation is scored on intelligibility, not on sounding British.
The overall band
The four skill bands are averaged, then rounded. .25 rounds up to the next half band; .75 rounds up to the next whole band. Anything lower rounds down.
Where the cheap marks usually are
Task response, not vocabulary
The most common Writing failure is answering a slightly different question from the one asked. Reading the prompt twice and planning for three minutes recovers more marks than any amount of vocabulary work.
Task 1 timing
Twenty minutes for Task 1, forty for Task 2, because Task 2 is worth double. Students who overrun on Task 1 damage the mark that matters more.
Speaking Part 2 structure
The two-minute solo turn is scored partly on your ability to keep going. Using the one minute of preparation to note four bullet points, rather than sentences, keeps you speaking for the full two minutes.
Reading time management
Sixty minutes, three passages, no extra transfer time on computer. Most students lose marks in passage three because they overspent on passage one, not because passage three was harder.
Facts worth knowing
- One Skill Retake lets you resit a single component within 60 days rather than the whole test. IELTS is the only major test offering this consistently.
- Results are valid for two years.
- Computer-delivered results arrive in roughly 1 to 5 days; paper-based takes around 13 days. IELTS for UKVI is computer-only in Pakistan since 1 October 2024.
- Most universities set a per-skill minimum as well as an overall band. A 7.0 overall with 5.5 in Writing fails a “6.0 in each” requirement.
- For a UK student visa at degree level you need CEFR B2, roughly 5.5 in every component, though your university will normally ask for more.
What we would tell you in the room
If you are half a band short, do not book another full test immediately. Work out which single skill is dragging the average, spend three weeks on that one skill, then use One Skill Retake. It is cheaper, faster, and it targets the arithmetic rather than hoping for a better day.
Test fees, formats and acceptance rules were checked in August 2026 and change without notice. Fees are planning figures, not quotes. Always confirm the current price on the official booking page, and confirm with your university in writing which test and which version it accepts before you pay. Compare every option on our English preparation page.
Keep reading
More on English preparation.
Next step
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