IELTS Speaking Part 1

Tablets: questions and Band 8 answers

The examiner asks three to five short questions on two or three everyday topics in the first four to five minutes. Here are 5 questions about tablets written by BandLadder in the examiner's style, each with a Band 8 sample answer. Aim for two or three sentences each: answer, reason, one detail.
  • 5 questions
  • 5 Band 8 answers
  • 4 to 5 minutes

5 answers

Sample answers

1

Do you use a tablet computer often?

Yeah, pretty much every single day. I usually keep one on my bedside table, so it's the first thing I reach for in the morning to check the news, and I often flick through a few articles before going to sleep at night.

2

What do you mainly use a tablet for?

Mostly for entertainment and light reading, to be honest. I find it really handy for streaming cooking tutorials while I'm preparing dinner in the kitchen, or for sketching digital illustrations when I have a bit of spare time on weekends.

3

Do you prefer using a tablet or a laptop?

It depends on the task, really, but for serious work I'd definitely choose a laptop. Typing long essays on a touchscreen can be quite fiddly, whereas a physical keyboard and a proper mouse let me get through assignments much faster.

4

Did you use tablets when you were a child?

No, not at all. When I was growing up, touchscreens weren't really a common household item yet. If we wanted to go online or play games, we had to share a bulky desktop computer in the living room instead.

5

Do you think tablets will completely replace paper books in the future?

I don't think they'll replace them entirely, no. While digital readers and tablets are incredibly convenient for travelling, a lot of people, myself included, still cherish the tactile feel of turning real paper pages and browsing through a physical bookshop.

Details are invented. Use the shape, not the sentences: examiners mark memorised answers down.

Answer out loud and get a band

The AI examiner asks Part 1 questions like these, listens, and scores fluency, vocabulary, grammar and pronunciation, with the words that cost you.

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7 words

Useful vocabulary

  • flick through

    to look through something quickly without reading every word

  • handy

    convenient or useful

  • fiddly

    awkward to handle, operate, or do

  • touchscreen

    a display screen that responds to touch

  • bulky

    large and difficult to move or store

  • tactile

    related to the sense of physical touch

  • cherish

    to hold dear or value something highly

  • →Avoid naming specific tech brands, and instead refer to devices generically using terms like tablet, e-reader, or portable gadget.
  • →When asked to compare devices, give concrete examples of activities you do on each one rather than just listing technical features.
  • →Use natural hesitation devices like 'it depends on the task, really' before giving a balanced preference.

Keep practising

More Part 1 topics

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