I Scored band 8 in my ielts test. Here's how i did IT

As I completed my bachelors degree recently, I had thought to take the IELTS test to be prepared for the opportunities of higher studies abroad. So I did and got an overall Score of Band 8.0. Here's my experience of preparing for the test, my experience of traveling to take the test in another city and the experience inside the exam centre.

Should you join preparatory classes for IELTS Test?

Short Answer - It depends on what your need is.

For me, it all began in December of 2025, when I initially had the thought to take the test. But only in early February I could make myself go look out for preparation classes. I personally was confident enough to self-prepare for the test, but with my sporadic schedule I knew i couldn't allot a fixed time per day to practice and prepare. Therefore I along with my friend, Nischal made a combined decision to search for and join preparation classes just so that we could have a dedicated schedule.

We opted for flexible class structure where instead of learning we directly jumped on practicing on a website named Engnovate. We were first given basic information about what each section of the test tests us on by our instructor. After that it was practice, and feedback based on the AI scores and some input from the Instructor. We practiced about 30-45 minutes per day for around 20-25 days.

IELTS test is not a typical test where you follow a certain syllabus follow it and you'll get good results. Rather, it is designed to test the level of English you already have. Taking preparatory classes does not improve your English, it is only supposed to optimize your score based on the language you already possess.

So join the preparatory classes If:

• You have basic English skills and need to optimize your chances of getting a good band score.

• You need a dedicated time to practice, like me.

• Have a short time to prepare and/or the sea of information on the internet is making you more confused.

In other cases, if you have the time and discipline to study by yourself, you can consider self-studying.

How I prepared for my Listening Test, and how you should as well.

If you have been listening to music, watching movies or videos on the Internet in English, it shouldn't be very hard. The problem comes when you need to identify what the answer actually could be. You might understand the conversation but keeping track of information points is hard.

Here are the problems you should look out for and train yourself accordingly:

• Short Attention Span: Since the listening test lasts for 60 minutes, you are most likely to loose your attention during the test. The first 5-7 minutes of Task 1 and Task 3 were the places where I think i lost attention most of the times. For the first test, you just need to get the hang of it so it feels fast and Task 3 is where the fatigue slightly creeps in and takes away your attention for brief few seconds and Boom you just lost one of your answers.

• Not taking the time to read the question beforehand: You are given a minute to look at the questions. Normally, I skipped the reading, as I thought I easily could answer in the Listening Test, and i was scoring 7-7.5 band on Listening test constantly during my practice. But I couldn't get a higher score, and I believe not reading to be the reason for this.

To tackle this:

• Go Fast: When practicing, play the sound of the test at a faster rate. I switched between 1.5x to 1.75x frequently. This trained my ears to process information fast, also not spend too much time and loose attention during practice. It was specially helpful during the actual test because the I perceived real test sound to be very slow, normal than usual. And you might wonder, didn't I loose focus on the test. And the answer for this is mentioned down below in another section.

• Read when you are instructed: When you are prompted to read in the test, then read just read the text. Try to understand what the context is and what type of conversation might come up. Try to pre-analyze and build a soft expectation of what the answer could be but be careful to not assume anything. Lastly, keep mental note of the keywords for each sentence, and when the word is spoken or a synonym is spoken then that is where your answer will most likely be.

Also, in the actual test, you will get to bookmark the questions you would want to re-visit again at the end. So don't forget to highlight the questions that needs a second guess.

How I prepared for my Reading Test, and how you should as well.

I won't go into the details of how you should prepare for each type of question. But here are the things that I did to prepare:

• Scan and Prioritize: The point is to scan the questions first not read them just yet. Identify the questions which, when you answer them, have to go through the complete text. Tackle those questions first so you will read the text completely while answering questions and won't have to re-read everything each time.

• Highlight: Whenever you answer a question, always highlight where you found the answer. And as you are searching answers for certain questions, also highlight for the probable answers of other question. Remember, you just scanned through the question before you started to answer?

These two main things helped me complete reading tasks on time. My average time to complete each task set were:

• Task 1 - 13 min

• Task 2 - 17 min

• Task 3- 25 min

So I used to get a minimum of 5 minutes extra to review my answers and get back to questions which I needed to review. Remember, these time stamps might be different for you, but always remember to prioritize what to answer first and if any question stalls you, leave them and re-visit them later.

How I prepared for my Writing Test, and how you should as well.

Writing was where I used to score my lowest, mainly because I think I did not know what information to highlight in my answers. I was getting at most 6.5 during my practice. But on the real test, I scored an Band 8.0 on writing. Maybe the AI was too harsh on checking, but i don't think so.

Here are my tips for both tasks on writing test:

• Task 1: I won't go over what you need to write on each paragraph, but i'll mention what things helped me increase my score.

  • Always build relation with data and never put data in isolation. Either always compare 2 given diagrams or graphs or two data points in a specific diagram. Don't just write data, show relationships either direct or indirect, try to explain the data like a story teller.

  • Think of a news article, it only tells you what you need to know. Always be selective about the information you write about. Task 1 is not about communicating data, it is where you display your skill of selecting only the relevant data. Try to remove redundant data or cluster them along with others if they aren't significant enough.

• Task 2: Again, I wont go over the basics like, vocabulary, grammar, spelling, paragraph structure or anything. There are few things that you should keep in mind.

  • Take your stance - There are 3 reasons why anything is written, it's either to Persuade, to Inform or to Entertain. So if the question is about sharing your opinion, then always take a stance and never stay neutral. When the question asks you for your opinion, it's asking you to write in a persuasive manner, but if you stay neutral, you change the mode to inform, now not fulfilling what the question asked for and you'll get low band on the task achievement.

  • Always support your thesis statement - In the first paragraph, always end with your thesis statement and whatever you write in the subsequent paragraphs, it should support your thesis statement. If one sentence doesn't and you're writing it to give the reader some extra* information - then remove the sentence as it won't serve any purpose.

  • Write things down - In the test, I was given an empty sheet of paper to write and brainstorm, and you will most likely receive it too. So, do not be shy and use just use what you have been given. First make a framework of what you will write in each sentence. Make a map of information touch points and jot them down. Take no more than 5 minutes to write down the information structure and you should be able to type out your answer in the next 20-25 minutes, leaving you some extra time as well.

  • Complete Task 2 first - I completed my task 2 in about 35 minutes, which was slower than I expected. But it also meant that I had 25 minutes to spend on task 1, or I could take the full 20 minutes and have the remaining 5 minutes to look back and remove extra spaces or correct spelling errors.

How I prepared for my Speaking Test, and how you can as well.

I am quite comfortable in my English speaking prowess and was confident to tackle any question. If you don't have practice in speaking English here is what I suggest you do, because I noticed I had the same issue when I first started speaking in English on a regular basis and that is:

• Breath Control: What I noticed is, the breath control required for speaking in English is slightly different than Nepali, and it might be for yours as well. Running out of breath even before completing the sentence, uneven voice pitch is what will lower your confidence.

To tackle this, try speaking English without any accent, just be comfortable with the accent you have. IELTS test is about your language skill test and not about how your accent is. (Don't quote me on this, I cannot personally verify this as well, this is based on the videos I have watched). But always ensure that the person doesn't have to think twice to understand what you are saying, just because you have heavy accent. Try to focus on your delivery, and speak like how you would naturally speak in your language. This worked for me, so it might work for you as well, the nuances languages differ, so my suggestion might not work for everyone.

To prepare for the test, here are the things you can do:

• Practice with another person - Practice by yourself for breath control but try to adjust yourself in a natural English conversation.

• Understand the format - Understand the format of questions that you will be asked and never stray away from the question. You are being tested on your skills to communicate, not on the amount of information you have or spew out. You only need to give small supporting context for your statements, do not overshare, or you might run the risk of straying too far from the question.

• Be ready for a conversation - This is something that I wasn't prepared for as well. I just assumed, there would be a linear set of questions that I would be asked. But it turns out questions are made on spot based on your answers, it's dynamic as well in the third round. So to stay on top of the conversation try to leave small gaps of information where the person on the other side has the room to ask you follow up questions which you already have the answer to in your 'brain RAM'.

So, these were the things that I learned while preparing for my IELTS test that might be useful for you.