IELTS Writing Task 1 Graph Compare & Contrast
Academic IELTS Writing Task 1 Graphs Practice: Compare & Contrast
Practise IELTS Academic Writing Task 1: Graphs with focused exercises on one of the key skills needed for Task Achievement: making meaningful comparisons. Learn to distinguish between simply listing figures and actively comparing them, use accurate language to describe differences and similarities, and combine trends to show how relationships between data change over time.
Before You Start
A strong Task 1 response does more than report numbers. You need to explain how the figures relate to one another by identifying differences, similarities, proportions, rankings and changes over time.
A weak approach:
“In 2021, households in Lagos spent 38% of their income on food, and households in Warsaw spent 21%.”
Both figures are accurate, but the sentence simply lists the data without explaining the difference.
A stronger approach:
“In 2021, households in Lagos spent 17 percentage points more of their income on food than households in Warsaw.”
This version makes the comparison explicit and quantifies the difference accurately. By learning to compare data rather than simply listing figures, you can write more informative sentences and develop clearer, better-organised body paragraphs.
Why This Exercise Matters
Why Comparing Data Matters in IELTS Academic Writing Task 1
Task Achievement requires you to select and clearly present the key features of a graph. Effective comparisons help you show which figures are higher or lower, how large the differences are, which categories are similar, and whether the relationships between categories change over time.
The problem it fixes
Many Task 1 responses lose marks because candidates list figures instead of comparing them, use inaccurate expressions to describe differences, or exaggerate how large a change is. Others confuse percentages with percentage points or fail to recognise when one category overtakes another.
This exercise addresses these problems through four stages: identifying comparison types, recognising effective comparisons, rewriting sentences using comparison language, and improving complete body paragraphs.
How it improves Task Response
Effective comparisons help you select and emphasise the most relevant information instead of describing every figure separately. You will practise language for:
Differences
Similarities
Proportions
Rankings
Changes in relationships
You will also learn to check whether your comparisons accurately reflect the figures and use the correct units.
The knock-on effect on your band
Task Achievement is one of the four IELTS Writing assessment criteria. Accurate, relevant comparisons help demonstrate that you have understood the data and selected its key features. They can also support Coherence and Cohesion by helping you connect related information within a paragraph.
The goal is not to make every sentence complicated. It is to make each comparison clear, accurate and useful to the reader.
Finished?
What to do Next
You’ve now practised identifying, constructing and improving comparisons in IELTS Academic Writing Task 1. The next step is to use these skills to write complete, well-organised body paragraphs.
Need more practice with comparison language? Return to the sentence exercises and focus on differences, proportions, similarities and rankings.
Unsure about percentage points? Review the difference between a change measured in percentages and a difference between two percentages.
Ready to write independently? Choose a graph and write two body paragraphs, grouping related categories and comparing their most important features.
Ready for the next step? Move on to IELTS Academic Writing Task 1: Graphs — Coherence and Cohesion to practise organising information into clear, logical paragraphs.
Task Response Guide
Want the full theory behind this drill?
Go back to the Task Response guide for the complete breakdown, examples, and band descriptors.
Keep Practising · Task Response
More Task Response Exercises
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The Other 3 IELTS Writing Task 1 Criteria
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