IELTS band score calculator.
Enter your four skill bands and we'll work out your overall IELTS band the official way: averaged across all four skills, then rounded to the nearest half band.
Your four skill bands
Listening
Reading
Writing
↓ lowest skill
Speaking
Overall band score
rounded to nearest ½
📈 To reach 7.0
Your average needs to hit 6.75. That's 3 more half-band lifts spread across your skills, no single skill tips it on its own.
Writingis your floor here, and it's the band most people move fastest.
How the overall band is worked out
Each skill is reported from 0 to 9 in half-band steps. Your overall is their average, rounded to the nearest half band. The catch is the tie-breaks: an average ending in .25 rounds up to the next half band, and one ending in .75 rounds up to the next whole band.
avg 6.25
avg 6.125
avg 3.875
Common questions
How is the IELTS overall band score calculated?
Your overall band is the average of your four skill bands (Listening, Reading, Writing and Speaking), rounded to the nearest half band. An average ending in .25 rounds up to the next half band, and one ending in .75 rounds up to the next whole band. So an average of 6.25 becomes 6.5, and 6.75 becomes 7.0.
Do all four skills count equally?
Yes. Each of the four skills contributes equally, 25% each, to your overall band. Within the Writing test itself Task 2 is weighted about twice as heavily as Task 1, but that only shapes your Writing band, not how the four skills combine.
Can improving one skill raise my overall band?
Often, yes. Because the overall is an average that rounds at the .25 and .75 marks, lifting your weakest skill by half a band can be enough to tip the rounding and raise your overall score. Writing is the skill most commonly holding people back.
Writing dragging your average down?
It's the skill most people lose half a band on. Paste a Task 1 or Task 2 essay and get an examiner-style band with the fixes that move you up.