The pie charts below compare water usage in San Diego, California and the rest of the world.
Sample Response
The pie charts show a comparison of water consumptions in domestic, industrial and agricultural sectors in San Diego, California with the rest of the world. Overall, global agricultural water consumption is far higher than that of industrial and household usages but in San Diego and California residential usages of water are noticeably higher. Getting back to the details, the global residential water consumption is only 8% which is remarkably lower than that of domestic water usages in Sand Diego and California. Residential water usages in San Diego is 60% which is around 20% higher than that of California. Furthermore, just below one-fourth of water is used for industrial need worldwide which is exactly the same ratio of San Diego’s industrial water use. On the contrary, California’s industrial water requirement is 33%, 10 percent higher than the global needs. Finally, global water consumption for farming is approximately 70% which is significantly higher than the use of water in San Diego and Califonia for the same purpose. Only 17% and 28% water is used for the cultivation purpose in San Diego and Califonia respectively.
IELTS Writing Correction
- 1. Use uncountable noun Original: water consumptions Suggested revision: water consumption Why it matters: Consumption is uncountable when referring to water use in general.
- 2. Use natural collocation Original: household usages Suggested revision: household use Why it matters: Household use is the standard uncountable expression in this context.
- 3. Use concise term Original: residential usages of water Suggested revision: residential water use Why it matters: This is a more natural and concise noun phrase for the category shown.
- 4. Add relative-clause comma Original: 8% which Suggested revision: 8%, which Why it matters: A comma is required before this non-defining relative clause.
- 5. Use uncountable form Original: domestic water usages Suggested revision: domestic water use Why it matters: Use is uncountable when it names this category of consumption.
- 6. Correct place name Original: Sand Diego Suggested revision: San Diego Why it matters: The location name is misspelled.
- 7. Use singular head noun Original: Residential water usages Suggested revision: Residential water use Why it matters: Use is uncountable and takes the singular verb that follows.
- 8. Use exact comparison Original: around 20% higher Suggested revision: 21 percentage points higher Why it matters: The chart shows 60% for San Diego and 39% for California, a 21-point gap.
- 9. Use purpose phrase Original: industrial need Suggested revision: industrial purposes Why it matters: The plural phrase industrial purposes is idiomatic after used for.
- 10. Fix comparison form Original: exactly the same ratio of Suggested revision: the same proportion as Why it matters: The comparative structure requires as rather than of.
- 11. Specify point difference Original: 10 percent higher Suggested revision: 10 percentage points higher Why it matters: California's 33% share exceeds the worldwide 23% share by ten percentage points.
- 12. Name comparison figure Original: global needs Suggested revision: worldwide figure Why it matters: The chart reports a usage proportion rather than an amount needed.
Suggested Rewrites
- water consumptions water consumption
- household usages household use
- residential usages of water residential water use
- 8% which 8%, which
- domestic water usages domestic water use
- Sand Diego San Diego
Why this response received Band 7.0
The response offers a clear overview and accurately reports all three uses across the locations, with effective comparisons such as the identical industrial shares in San Diego and worldwide. Progression is easy to follow despite the absence of paragraph breaks, but recurring plural, agreement, spelling, and collocation problems reduce precision. The most useful improvement is to group the overview and details into separate paragraphs and use singular category labels consistently.
IELTS Writing Criteria Scores
Detailed feedback by IELTS writing criterion after the annotated essay.
Task Achievement
The overview identifies the key contrast and the detailed figures and comparisons are comprehensive and essentially accurate.
Express numerical differences as percentage points where appropriate and preserve exact place names to make the already strong data coverage fully precise.
Coherence and Cohesion
Information progresses logically from the overview through residential, industrial, and agricultural use, although presenting everything in one paragraph weakens the visible structure.
Place the introduction and overview in one paragraph and organise the detailed comparisons into one or two separate, clearly focused paragraphs.
Lexical Resource
The response uses a reasonable range of comparative and topic vocabulary, but repeated nonstandard plurals, misspellings, and awkward collocations reduce lexical accuracy.
Use water consumption and water use as uncountable forms, spell the locations accurately, and replace expressions such as industrial need with industrial use.
Grammatical Range and Accuracy
The response combines simple and complex sentences effectively, though agreement, article, and noun-form errors recur throughout without obscuring the comparisons.
Check agreement after singular subjects, add missing prepositions and articles, and use structures such as 17% of water is used consistently.