The charts below show the percentage of food budget the average family spent on restaurant meals in different years. The graph shows the number of meals eaten in fast food restaurants and sit-down restaurants.
Sample Response
The pie charts outline the proportion of their food budget that people spentthe ratio of food budget people spent on preparing meals at home and on restaurant meals and the line graph shows how often people ate in fast-food and sit-down restaurantsdelineates what type of outside food people preferred between 1970 and 2000. Overall, people’s spending on restaurant meals increased significantly over the period and fast food became more popular over timeover the time. As shown in the chartsAs is presented in the illustration, people spent 10% of their food budget on restaurant mealsto have outside meals in 1970 and this proportion increasedthis spending ratio enlarged each decade. In 1990, they spent more than one-third of the foodmeal budget to eat at restaurants and by 2000finally in 2000, people spent half of their food budget on restaurant mealsto eat outside. The line graph shows that people ate 20 fast food meals in 1970 and the same number of sit-down restaurant meals that yearthe same number of sitdown eatery meals in this year. After a decade, the number of sit-down restaurant mealsthe number of sitdown dining occurrence rose slightly abovewent slightly higher than the number of fast food meals they had. However, the popularity of fast food remarkably increased and people ate nearly 90 mealspeople ate as high as 90 meals in fast-food restaurantsfast food shops in 2000 while they ate around 50 sit-down restaurant meals that yearwhen they had around 50 sitdown meals in this year.
Why this response received Band 7.0
The response presents a clear overview and accurately captures the main rise in restaurant spending and the growing dominance of fast food, supported by several relevant figures. Its main limitation is selective coverage, especially the omission of the 1980 budget figure and most intermediate meal-frequency data; the highest priority is to compare more of the key values across both charts while retaining the concise organisation.
IELTS Writing Criteria Scores
Task Achievement
A clear overview and several accurate figures cover both visuals, though some important intermediate data are omitted.
Include the 1980 restaurant-budget figure and compare the 1990 meal frequencies to provide more complete coverage.
Coherence and Cohesion
The report progresses logically from the overview to budget changes and then restaurant types, with clear linking throughout.
Use separate body paragraphs for the pie charts and line graph to make the visual grouping even clearer.
Lexical Resource
The response shows good range, but collocations such as 'spending ratio enlarged' and 'sitdown dining occurrence' are unnatural.
Prefer precise chart language such as 'the proportion rose' and 'the number of sit-down meals' when reporting changes.
Grammatical Range and Accuracy
A range of complex structures is generally controlled, with only occasional agreement, article, and phrasing errors.
Check noun-number agreement and article use in phrases such as 'the number of sit-down dining occurrences'.
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IELTS Academic Writing Task 1
The charts below show the percentage of food budget the average family spent on restaurant meals in different years. The graph shows the number of meals eaten in fast food restaurants and sit-down restaurants.
Your response
Write the task yourself, then compare your choices with the annotated response.