Example
rise (verb)
The neutral partner of increase and the safest swap. It never takes an object.
Rice exports rose from 2 million to 3.5 million tonnes between 2010 and 2020.
Written by Fizza Butool Zaidi and Ali Zaidi
12 alternatives
The neutral partner of increase and the safest swap. It never takes an object.
Rice exports rose from 2 million to 3.5 million tonnes between 2010 and 2020.
Don't swap blindly: Rise has no object. 'The government rose taxes' is wrong; a person or organisation raises something.
Natural with populations, economies, cities, markets and membership; less natural with prices.
The urban population grew steadily throughout the period.
A steady, often gradual rise, usually towards a high level.
Average monthly rents climbed steadily, reaching £950 by 2020.
Neutral and common in speech. In a report, use it once at most; single-word verbs read as more formal.
Bus fares have gone up every year since I started college.
A sudden, large rise over a short time.
Online grocery orders surged in 2020, almost doubling in twelve months.
Rise very quickly to a high level. Strong, so keep it for the most dramatic change on the chart.
Bicycle sales soared from 20,000 to 95,000 in just three years.
Don't swap blindly: Do not use it for a modest rise; it overstates the data, and accurate description is part of the Task Achievement score.
A sudden rise in one step between two neighbouring points.
The share of remote workers jumped from 12% to 30% between 2019 and 2020.
Exact multiples. Precise, so examiners see that you have read the figures.
The number of museum visitors doubled, from 4,000 to 8,000.
Don't swap blindly: Only if the figure really doubled. A move from 4,000 to 7,500 'almost doubled'.
Growth in size, area or scope: a network, a market, a city, a company.
The tram network expanded from 30 to 48 kilometres over the decade.
Don't swap blindly: Not for prices, rates or percentages. 'Prices expanded' is wrong.
Rise in a way that is unwelcome: costs, tension, conflict.
Repair costs escalated after 2015 as the bridge aged.
Don't swap blindly: It carries a negative judgement. Do not use it for neutral data such as student enrolments.
A rise that follows a fall, back towards an earlier level. Pick up is less formal.
Hotel bookings dipped in 2012 but recovered the following year.
Don't swap blindly: Only after a previous fall; otherwise it misdescribes the chart.
Very fast, dramatic rise. Journalistic and informal.
House prices in my city have skyrocketed since the metro opened.
Don't swap blindly: Avoid it in Academic Task 1; choose soar or surge for the same idea in a formal register.
Paraphrasing
Band tip: the public IELTS Writing band descriptors for Lexical Resource describe Band 7 as using “less common lexical items” with “some awareness of style and collocation”. A synonym that changes your meaning or breaks a collocation works against you, so choose the word that fits the sentence, not the rarest one you know.
In context
Passenger numbers climbed steadily from 2.1 million to 3.4 million over the first six years, before surging to 5.8 million in 2017, when a second line opened. After a slight dip in 2018, the figure recovered and grew to 6.2 million by the end of the period, almost three times the 2010 level.
Rise is the safest because it means the same and fits almost any noun. For more detail, pair rise or increase with an adverb (sharply, gradually, slightly), or use surge for a sudden large rise and climb for a steady one.
Not in Academic Task 1. It is journalistic and informal. Soar or surge express a dramatic rise in a register that suits a report. In Speaking, skyrocket is fine.
Rise has no object: prices rise. Raise needs one: the council raised prices. Charts usually show things rising on their own, so rise is the verb you need in most Task 1 reports.
There is no fixed limit. Two or three uses spread across a report, mixed with the noun form and one or two alternatives, read naturally. What lowers a score is a misused synonym, not a repeated accurate word.
Practise
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