Academic Task 1 gives you a chart, table, diagram or map and asks you to describe it. You have about 20 minutes and a 150-word minimum, and it is worth a third of your Writing score against Task 2's two thirds — so spend the 20 minutes and not a minute more.
The single most valuable sentence in the whole task is the overview: one or two sentences saying what is true about the data as a whole. Highest and lowest. The overall direction. The thing a reader would notice from across the room. Scripts that describe every number and never stand back are the most common reason a well-written Task 1 stalls.
A structure that works every time:
- One sentence restating what the visual shows, in your own words. Never copy the prompt.
- The overview. Two sentences, no numbers, starting "Overall,".
- Two body paragraphs grouping the detail — biggest and smallest, or first half and second half, or the two categories that behave differently. Use figures to support the grouping, not to list it.
There is no conclusion, no opinion, and no explanation of why the data looks like this. A Task 1 that speculates about causes is answering a question nobody asked.
On language: the marking rewards accurate comparison, not decoration. Learn a small set of comparison patterns cold — rose sharply, fell steadily, levelled off, almost doubled, roughly a third of — and use them precisely. Ten precise sentences beat twenty ambitious ones.
Finally: write about what the data shows, not what you would like it to show. If a line goes up and then flattens, both halves belong in the sentence.