What is your daily routine?
A routine question is a grammar question in disguise. The examiner wants the present simple used properly, time phrases (first thing, by noon, after that), and some sense of what a normal day actually feels like to you.
Don't walk through every hour from 7am to midnight. Give the shape of the day and pick the one part worth talking about: the best bit, the worst bit, or the bit that's unusual.
Sample answers at 3 bands
Same question, three answers. Read them out loud and notice what changes: not longer words, but more detail, better linking and a bit of you in it.
I wake up at 7 o'clock, then I have breakfast and I go to university. I have class until 3. After I come back home and I study and I watch TV. I sleep at 11.
Why it scores Band 5.5: Correct facts in order, but every sentence has the same shape ("I + verb"). There's no comment, no feeling and almost no linking beyond "then" and "after".
On weekdays it's pretty fixed. I'm up at seven, I grab a coffee and I'm on the bus by half past. Lectures take up most of the morning, and the afternoon is usually library time. Evenings are the only part that changes: some days the gym, some days just Netflix.
Why it scores Band 7: Varied time phrases ("by half past", "take up most of the morning"), natural verbs like "grab", and a comment at the end that breaks the list. Solid Band 7.
My weekdays run like clockwork, which I find oddly comforting. Up at seven, coffee, bus, lectures. The part I actually look forward to is the hour after lunch when I'm in the library with my phone switched off. It's the only stretch of the day when I get anything done without interruptions.
Why it scores Band 8: It summarises the routine in four words, then spends its time on one meaningful part. "Run like clockwork" and "oddly comforting" are precise and natural rather than memorised.
Bands are our estimate against the public IELTS Speaking band descriptors. In the real test your band comes from all three parts, not one answer.
The follow-up questions
Part 1 stays on one topic for three or four questions. These are the ones that usually come next.
- Is your routine different at weekends?
- Completely. I don't set an alarm, so I usually wake up around ten, and the day just happens. Sometimes that means seeing friends, sometimes it means doing absolutely nothing, which I think everyone needs once a week.
- Do you like having a routine?
- Mostly, yes. Having a routine means I don't waste energy deciding what to do next. But if every week were exactly the same, I'd go a bit crazy, so I like to break it now and then.
- Has your routine changed in the last few years?
- Quite a lot. When I was at school someone else organised my day for me. Now that I'm at university I have to plan it myself, and it took me a while to get used to that.
- What part of your day do you like the most?
- Probably the early evening, when the work's done and I can call my family or cook something. It's the part of the day that feels like mine.
Words that lift this answer
- first thing in the morning
- "First thing in the morning I check my messages, which is a terrible habit."
- run like clockwork
- A routine that never changes.
- take up
- "Classes take up most of my morning."
- wind down
- Slowly relax before bed.
- a night owl / an early bird
- Someone who likes late nights or early mornings.
- break the routine
- Do something different on purpose.
Mistakes that cost marks here
- Reciting the whole day hour by hour. It's long, flat and every sentence sounds the same.
- "I sleep at 11" when you mean "I go to bed at 11" (you sleep all night).
- Using only "then" to link. Try "after that", "by the time", "once" and "before".
Reading answers won't move your band. Saying them will.
Take a full Cambridge Speaking test: the examiner's questions are played out loud, you answer, and you get a band for fluency, vocabulary, grammar and pronunciation. 10 free corrections a day.