International English Language Testing System popularly referred to as IELTS is the most well-known English language exam in the world. Over two million test takers enrol for IELTS every year. With this test, an individual can live, work, or study in any part of the world. As a matter of fact, over 9,000 organizations in more than 140 countries acknowledge IELTS. For instance, if you want to apply for a visa to immigrate to the UK or Canada, this test is one of the approved English language exams that you can present.

The IELTS exam is made up of four major sections with a variety of question types and exercises and the completion time allocated for the test is about three hours. It tests the candidates’ skills and expertise in English skills covering the Listening, Speaking, Reading, and Writing.

IELTS Listening Skills

This section contains a total of four sub-sections made up of ten questions each. The time allotted to the total section is thirty minutes and the students are given an additional ten minutes to fill the answers into their answer sheets. The candidates are required to write down the answers to the exam questions in the papers first before transferring it to the answer sheet. In this section, each question set is based on a specific pre-recorded listening passage. This pre-recorded voice will be played to the candidate once, after which exam questions will be administered. Each part of the listening passage is distinctive in terms of number of speakers and the topic of discourse. The first two sets of passages are based on topics of general interest covering one monologue and one conversation. The second set of passages focus on academic subjects covering conversation between students and tutors or students and students, and a monologue such as a teaching or training session. In this part, the candidates should expect various kinds of questions, such as multiple choice, chart completion, sentence completion, matching, short answer, classification, and labelling of diagram.

IELTS Speaking Skills

In this section, the candidates will be taken through a live interview process, which will be recorded for assessment at the end of the exam. The speaking section is made up of three part structure designed to be completed within 11 to 14 minutes. In the first part of the test, which takes about 4 to 5 minutes, the students will be required to answer questions on different topics that they are familiar with, such as current events, preferences, and hobbies. In the second part, the candidates will be asked to discuss certain topic that is given in the provided booklet, they will be required to develop their discussion within one minutes. The whole duration allotted to this section is a total of 3 to 4 minutes. The third part of the test structure is focused on more comprehensive questions on the topic that is discussed in the part two.

IELTS Reading Skill

This section for the academic and the general training exam differs. The major difference between these two is simply the subject matter of the reading comprehension passages. The general training reading section contains a total of 5 to 6 texts that are mostly short and designed for wider readerships. The academic reading section, on the other hand, covers three different academic texts. The duration, number of sections, and total number of questions are the same for both categories of the exam. The Reading section is made up of three parts and a total of 40 questions. The time allotted to this part of the exam is one hour.

IELTS Writing Skills

This section is different for the academic and the general training test, although, they have a lot in common. For both categories, the candidates are given a total of 60 minutes to complete two differently timed writing assignments. The first task is allotted 20 minutes for completion and it is about half of the second task which is given 40 minutes for completion. Each essay is appraised based on similar evaluation criteria. The short essay in the general training test is a written letter in reaction to a specific situation while the academic test’s short essay is a description essay of a graph or chart. The long exercise on both exams is discussion-based where the candidates are required to present a solution to a specific problem or argue a certain position. The recommended word length for the long essays is 250 words and 150 words for the short one.