How are your IELTS Speaking scores calculated?

The IELTS Speaking assesses your ability to communicate in English. The examiner awards band scores for your spoken English-language skills. The Speaking test will take place in a face-to-face interview with a qualified IELTS examiner in a quiet room.

IELTS Speaking are conducted by trained and certified IELTS examiners. They must hold a relevant teaching qualification and have extensive teaching experience to become an IELTS examiner. When assessing your performance, they work with clearly defined criteria to assess your Speaking test.

Examiners assess your performance against 4 criteria. Fluency and coherence, lexical resource, grammatical range and accuracy, and pronunciation. Your Speaking results are given as band scores which range from a band 0 to a band 9. Each whole and half band score corresponds to a level of English-language competence.

To find out more about the assessment criteria used by IELTS examiners, search online for the IELTS Speaking public band descriptors.

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How is IELTS marked?

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Band scores

Speaking band scores

Band 9

Fluency and coherence
Speaks fluently with only rare repetition or self-correction; any hesitation is content-related rather than to find words or grammar

Speaks coherently with fully appropriate cohesive features

Develops topics fully and appropriately

Lexical resource
Uses vocabulary with full flexibility and precision in all topics

Uses idiomatic language naturally and accurately

Grammatical range and accuracy
Uses a full range of structures naturally and appropriately

Produces consistently accurate structures apart from ‘slips’

Pronunciation
Uses a full range of pronunciation features with precision and subtlety

Sustains flexible use of features throughout

Is effortless to understand

Band 8

Fluency and coherence
Speaks fluently with only occasional repetition or self- correction; hesitation is usually content-related and only rarely to search for language

Develops topics coherently and appropriately

Lexical resource
Uses a wide vocabulary resource readily and flexibly to convey precise meaning

Uses less common and idiomatic vocabulary skilfully, with occasional inaccuracies

Uses paraphrase effectively as required

Grammatical range and accuracy
Uses a wide range of structures flexibly

Produces a majority of error-free sentences with only very occasional inappropriacies or basic/non-systematic errors

Pronunciation
Uses a wide range of pronunciation features

Sustains flexible use of features, with only occasional lapses

Is easy to understand throughout; L1 accent has minimal effect on intelligibility

Band 7

Fluency and coherence
Speaks at length without noticeable effort or loss of coherence

May demonstrate language-related hesitation at times, or some repetition and/or self-correction

Uses a range of connectives and discourse markers with some flexibility
Lexical resource
Uses vocabulary resource flexibly to discuss a variety of topics

Uses some less common and idiomatic vocabulary and shows some awareness of style and collocation, with some inappropriate choices

Uses paraphrase effectively
Grammatical range and accuracy
Uses a range of complex structures with some flexibility

Frequently produces error-free sentences, though some grammatical mistakes persist
Pronunciation
Shows all the positive features of Band 6 and some, but not all, of the positive features of Band 8

Band 6

Fluency and coherence
Is willing to speak at length, though may lose coherence at times due to occasional repetition, self-correction or hesitation

Uses a range of connectives and discourse markers but not always appropriately
Lexical resource
Has a wide enough vocabulary to discuss topics at length and make meaning clear in spite of inappropriacies

Generally paraphrases successfully
Grammatical range and accuracy
Uses a mix of simple and complex structures, but with limited flexibility

May make frequent mistakes with complex structures, though these rarely cause comprehension problems
Pronunciation
Uses a range of pronunciation features with mixed control

Shows some effective use of features but this is not sustained

Can generally be understood throughout, though mispronunciation of individual words or sounds reduces clarity at times

Band 5

Fluency and coherence
Usually maintains flow of speech but uses repetition, self correction and/or slow speech to keep going

May over-use certain connectives and discourse markers

Produces simple speech fluently, but more complex communication causes fluency problems
Lexical resource
Manages to talk about familiar and unfamiliar topics but uses vocabulary with limited flexibility

Attempts to use paraphrase but with mixed success
Grammatical range and accuracy
Produces basic sentence forms with reasonable accuracy

Uses a limited range of more complex structures, but these usually contain errors and may cause some comprehension problems
Pronunciation
Shows all features of band 4 and some, but not all the positive features of band 6

Band 4

Fluency and coherence
Cannot respond without noticeable pauses and may speak slowly, with frequent repetition and self-correction

Links basic sentences but with repetitious use of simple connectives and some breakdowns in coherence
Lexical resource
Is able to talk about familiar topics but can only convey basic meaning on unfamiliar topics and makes frequent errors in word choice

Rarely attempts paraphrase
Grammatical range and accuracy
Produces basic sentence forms and some correct simple sentences but subordinate structures are rare

Errors are frequent and may lead to misunderstanding
Pronunciation
Uses a limited range of pronunciation features

Attempts to control features but lapses are frequent

Mispronunciations are frequent and cause some difficulty for the listener

Band 3

Fluency and coherence
Speaks with long pauses

Has limited ability to link simple sentences

Gives only simple responses and is frequently unable to convey basic message

Lexical resource
Uses simple vocabulary to convey personal information

Has insufficient vocabulary for less familiar topics

Grammatical range and accuracy
Attempts basic sentence forms but with limited success, or relies on apparently memorised utterances

Makes numerous errors except in memorised expressions

Pronunciation
Shows some of the features of band 2 and some, but not all, of the positive features of band 4

Band 2

Fluency and coherence
Pauses lengthily before most words
Little communication possible
Lexical resource
Only produces isolated words or memorised utterances
Grammatical range and accuracy
Cannot produce basic sentence forms
Pronunciation
Speech is often unintelligible

Band 1

Fluency and coherence
No communication possible
No rateable language
Lexical resource
No communication possible
No rateable language
Grammatical range and accuracy
No communication possible
No rateable language
Pronunciation
No communication possible
No rateable language

Band 0

Fluency and coherence
Does not attend
Lexical resource
Does not attend
Grammatical range and accuracy
Does not attend
Pronunciation
Does not attend