IELTS Vocabulary: How Words Are Scored and How to Build a Band 7 Vocabulary

What examiners actually reward

• Collocations: 'heavy traffic', 'raise awareness', 'a daunting task' — natural word partnerships.
• Topic vocabulary: words specific to the theme, like 'curb emissions' for environment essays.
• Paraphrasing: saying the same idea differently without repeating the question's words.
• Accuracy: a simple word used correctly scores more than an impressive word used wrongly.

What examiners penalise

• Memorised 'fancy' phrases that do not fit the sentence.
• Wrong collocations: 'make a photo', 'say an opinion' — these cap your score.
• Repetition: using 'important' five times when 'crucial', 'vital' and 'significant' exist.
• Informal words in Writing Task 2: 'kids', 'stuff', 'a lot of'.

A learning system that works

• Learn words in phrases, never alone: not 'emission' but 'curb emissions', 'carbon emissions'.
• Study by topic: education, environment, technology, health — the ten core essay themes.
• Use new words in your own sentences the same day you learn them.
• Review with spaced repetition: day 1, day 3, day 7, day 14.

How many words do you need?

For Band 7, aim for active control of roughly 300–400 topic-specific phrases across the ten core themes, plus a solid set of linking and opinion language. That is very achievable in 8–12 weeks of focused study.

Practise actively

Our Vocabulary section has word lists organised by IELTS topic with a matching game to test recall, and the AI feedback on your Writing and Speaking practice flags weak or repeated vocabulary in your own answers.