In this post: How to choose data in a table, a rewritten pie chart paragraph, a vocabulary list, common ways to lose marks, FAQs, a 20-minute routine, a checklist and a quick exercise.
Writing About Static Charts · 3 parts
- 1. Chart types, plans and proportions
- 2. Ranking, contrast and respectively
- 3. Tables, mistakes and practice (you are here)
✦ In this post
- 9. Tables: lots of data, so you must choose well
- 10. Rewrite: Body 1 of the hotel satisfaction essay
- 11. Vocabulary for static charts
- 12. Common ways to lose marks
- 13. Static charts: frequently asked questions
- 14. A 20-minute routine for static charts
- 15. Checklist after writing
- 16. Quick practice: fix the “respectively”
9. Tables: lots of data, so you must choose well
Tables are the hardest static charts, because every number is clearly visible and it is tempting to include them all. My three table essays happen to show three different situations:
| Essay | Scores (TA / CC / LR / GRA) | What went right | What to fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| Task 22: underground railways | 6 / 7 / 7 / 7 | The Overview caught that London was the oldest and longest and Tokyo had the most passengers | Washington was not mentioned at all; three body paragraphs were too detailed; “two of them have more than 1000 million” had an unclear reference |
| Task 24: Fairtrade | 6 / 8 / 7 / 7 | A very accurate Overview: coffee sales rose everywhere, and banana sales rose everywhere except Belgium and Sweden | “doubled the amount in 1999, Switzerland sold 6 million coffee” is a dangling structure, and “coffee” cannot be used as a countable noun here |
| Task 47: facility satisfaction | 7 / 8 / 7 / 7–8 | Three paragraphs, one per facility, each comparing undergraduates and postgraduates | The figure for undergraduates “quite satisfied” with the canteen was 35%, but I wrote 30%; “Moving through” should be “Moving on to” |
At the end of the underground essay I wrote myself a question: with this much data, how do I keep it short? Looking back now, the answer was in the Overview. The Overview already said that London was the oldest and longest, Tokyo had the most passengers and Kyoto was the shortest with the fewest. The body only needed to add the figures for those three points, plus Paris (second in both length and passengers), and one sentence placing Washington in the middle. That keeps it to about 180 words. A table question is not about “translating the table into sentences”; it is about “finding evidence for your Overview”.
✗ Original: Besides that, doubled the amount in 1999, Switzerland sold 6 million coffee in 2004.
→ Revised: Switzerland’s coffee sales doubled from 3 million to 6 million euros.
(Task 24) The subject of the participle phrase “doubled …” is not Switzerland but the sales figure. The table’s unit is millions of euros, so state it.
10. Rewrite: Body 1 of the hotel satisfaction essay
My hotel-satisfaction pie-chart essay (Task 27) scored 7, but the first body paragraph misread the legend twice: it treated the 14% for “Good” as “Excellent”, and it used “most of people” for 45%. Here is the original and a model rewrite:
Original (Task 27, Body 1, unchanged)
Regarding the pie chart in 2005, most of people thought customer service was satisfactory, which accounted for 45%, followed by the percentage of “Poor”, making up 21% of the sample. Following that, customers who considered service “Excellent” and “Very poor” contributed almost equally, constituting 14% and 15%, respectively, of the total.
Model rewrite
In 2005, the largest group of guests (45%) rated the service as satisfactory, followed by 21% who described it as poor. Similar proportions chose “good” and “very poor”, at 14% and 15% respectively, while only 5% considered the service excellent.
- most of people → the largest group of guests: 45% is less than half, so it cannot be “most”; and “most of” must be followed by “the”.
- Excellent → good: checking the legend, the 14% slice is “Good”; “Excellent” is only 5%.
- Add the 5% for “Excellent”: the original left this category out completely.
- Remove “constituting … of the total”: this paragraph is about proportions of guests, and “at 14% and 15% respectively” is more concise.
11. Vocabulary for static charts
| Function | Words and phrases |
|---|---|
| Proportion nouns | proportion, percentage, share, figure, ratio (use sparingly) |
| Verbs for “takes up” | account for, make up, constitute, comprise, represent, take up |
| Ranking | the largest, the second largest, the smallest, rank first, come last |
| Main item | the main contributor, the predominant factor, dominant, major |
| Equal | equal, identical, the same proportion, contribute equally, each |
| Difference | differ, the gap between, twice as much as, three times higher than |
| Exceptions | except, with the exception of, the only exception was |
| What is left | the remaining X%, the rest, the remainder |
12. Common ways to lose marks
| Problem | Criterion affected | My examples |
|---|---|---|
| Misreading the legend or colours | TA | Task 27: “Good” read as “Excellent”; Trial 2: a row misread |
| Leaving out a category completely | TA | Task 22: Washington missing; Task 14: food (27%) and transport (9%) in Hong Kong not mentioned |
| Using “most” for less than half | TA / LR | Task 27, Task 44 |
| “Respectively” with a single figure | GRA | Task 11, Task 42 |
| Superlative without “the”; “number” with “big” | GRA / LR | Task 22, Task 24 |
| Naming the wrong “smallest” item | TA | Task 2: I said domestic use in Central Asia (7%) was the smallest, but industry (5%) was actually smaller |
| Too many paragraphs, repeated content | CC | Task 2: all three body paragraphs said agriculture was largest |
13. Static charts: frequently asked questions
Q1: Do I have to mention every slice of a pie chart? With five slices or fewer, you should in principle mention every one, at least by grouping the small ones together in a single sentence. With six or more, you can cover just the top three and the smallest, but the Overview should give the reader a sense of the overall distribution. In my household-spending essay I left out food (27%) and transport (9%) in Hong Kong. That essay still got 8 for TA, but transport was 17% in the UK and only 9% in Hong Kong, which would have been a very good point of comparison. It was a pity to miss it.
Q2: Can I put figures in brackets? Occasionally, for example industrial use (53%) and agricultural use (32%). But if the whole essay relies on brackets, it reads like notes rather than a piece of writing. Later on I tended to write “accounting for 53%” or “at 32%”, which puts the numbers inside the sentence and gives more variety of structure.
Q3: The question has six regions. Should I write three body paragraphs? I would not recommend it. Three paragraphs are not wrong, but a Task 1 report is only 170–200 words, so three paragraphs leave each one with two sentences, and the content easily becomes repetitive. Two paragraphs are the safest choice, provided you can find a sensible way to group the data, such as “mainly industrial vs mainly agricultural”.
Q4: Can I use “increase” and “decrease” for a static chart? Not for a chart with a single point in time: with no time, there is no change. When you compare two places, though, you can use “higher”, “lower” or “twice as much”. For pie charts or tables with two years, trend words are fine, for example coffee sales rose in all five countries.
14. A 20-minute routine for static charts
| Time | What to do |
|---|---|
| 0–3 min | Circle the largest and smallest in each chart; look for shared features (is A largest everywhere?) and exceptions; for two years, find what changed most |
| 3–6 min | Introduction (chart type, topic, place, time) + a two-sentence Overview |
| 6–16 min | Two paragraphs, by chart, by year or by category. In each: largest → second → similar items in one sentence → smallest, with at least one cross-chart comparison |
| 16–20 min | Check every figure against the legend; check “respectively”, “most” and “the” + superlative |
15. Checklist after writing
- ☐ Is every category, city and country mentioned at least once?
- ☐ Have I checked each figure against the legend (colours, hatching, labels)?
- ☐ Have I avoided “most” and “the majority” for anything under 50%?
- ☐ Does “respectively” have the same number of items on each side, in the same order? With only one figure, have I used “each” instead?
- ☐ Does every superlative have “the”? Does “number” go with “large/small”?
- ☐ Have I used “whereas/by contrast” for differences and “similarly/both” for similarities, without mixing them up?
- ☐ Is there at least one comparison across charts or across years?
- ☐ Mixed charts: do both the Introduction and the Overview cover both charts?
16. Quick practice: fix the “respectively”
1. Food and housing accounted for 20% respectively.
2. The UK and France produced 30 and 45 units, respectively, while Japan and Korea produced 10 and 12 units, respectively.
3. Private studios and school halls made up 48% and 24% separately.
Answers
1. Food and housing each accounted for 20%. (There is only one figure.)
2. Split it into two sentences, or rewrite the second half: …, while the figures for Japan and Korea were much lower, at 10 and 12 units. (Keep only one “respectively” per sentence.)
3. … made up 48% and 24% respectively. (Change “separately” to “respectively”.)
Further reading
- Review of my tutor Ali: simplifying my essay structure (400 → 300 words) (in Chinese)
- How to check your IELTS sub-scores (in Chinese)
- Farid, a former examiner: live feedback on speaking and writing (in Chinese)
- Recommended free IELTS resources online (in Chinese)
- Overview of all my IELTS notes (in Chinese)
This is the last part of “Writing About Static Charts”. To start again, go back to Part 1.
IELTS Notes in English · Task 1 Structure (post 4 of 7)
← Previous: How to Write About Trends in IELTS Task 1: Verbs, Adverbs and Two Essential Patterns
Next →: How to Write an IELTS Task 1 Process Diagram: Passive Voice, Sequencers and the Overview
Task 1 Structure · Task 2 Structure · Topic Guides · Writing Language · Band Score Samples · Practice Methods · Speaking & Study Tips
✦ Target Your Future
Some days you practise for hours and the score still does not move. I hope these notes remind you that the setbacks are part of the road: every recording you replayed, every essay you rewrote and every sentence you finally dared to say is progress you have already made.
I wrote this down so the next person can take fewer detours. You do not have to follow my method exactly. Find a rhythm that works for you, rest when you need to, and come back for the next small step.
I hope what you take away is more than a number on a score report: a little more confidence in yourself, and the courage to step a bit closer to the world.
— Ting
← Back to IELTS notes in English
Leave a Reply