IELTS Speaking Part 2 Cue Cards: Topics, Model Answers

Part 2 is the only part of the IELTS Speaking test where you talk alone for two minutes, and it is the part most candidates fear. It is also the most learnable, because the cue cards follow a small set of patterns. This guide covers the official format, a one-minute note method that works under pressure, eight cue cards with their bullets, two full model answers, the linking words that keep a long turn moving, and a practice plan.

The IELTS Speaking Part 2 format

Part 2 lasts three to four minutes including one minute of preparation, and you speak for up to two minutes on one task card. IELTS’s Speaking format page calls it the “Long turn”: the examiner gives you a card that names a topic and lists the points to include, plus paper and a pencil for notes. After your talk the examiner asks one or two follow-up questions on the same topic, then moves to Part 3.

The card always has the same shape: a first line that says “Describe a …”, three bullets that start with “who / what / where / when”, and a final line that starts “and explain …”. That last line is the one candidates forget and the one that produces your best language, because it asks for a reason or a feeling rather than facts.

How to use the one minute: the keyword-and-feeling method

Use the minute to choose one specific example and write five words, not to write sentences. Writing sentences uses the whole minute on the first bullet and leaves you reading aloud, which kills your intonation.

1. Seconds 0–10: pick the example. The first real one that comes to mind, not the best one. A real memory gives you details for free; an invented one makes you pause.
2. Seconds 10–40: one keyword per bullet. Next to each bullet write the one word that will unlock a sentence: “Priya”, “2019”, “rooftop”, “lost the keys”.
3. Seconds 40–55: the feeling and the change. Write one word for the “explain” line: “relieved”, “embarrassed”, “still use it”. This becomes your closing 20 seconds.
4. Seconds 55–60: the first sentence. Decide the exact words you will open with, so the talk starts without a gap: “The person I’d like to describe is…”.

You may look at your notes while you talk. Glance, do not read. If you lose your place, the bullets on the card are a map back.

In this guide

• 8 common cue cards with bullet prompts
• Two full model answers
• Linking words for a two-minute talk
• Timing and the rounding-off questions
• Mistakes and a practice plan

8 common IELTS Speaking Part 2 cue cards

Almost every Part 2 card in 2026 fits one of eight types, and the table shows the type, a card in exam wording and the example you would prepare. Prepare one real story per type, then practise bending it to new cards: a “helpful stranger” story also answers “a time someone surprised you” and “a kind act you remember”.

Notice the tense each card forces: “would like to do” is a future or hypothetical talk, “still use” needs present perfect and present, “were late” is past narrative. Reading the tense off the card in your one minute prevents the most common grammar error in Part 2.

Two full model answers

Both answers below run about 180 words, which most people speak in 1 minute 40 to 2 minutes. They are written the way a band-7 speaker talks: specific, slightly informal, one or two self-corrections left in. Say them aloud once to hear the length, then never say them again; build your own.

Describe a person who has influenced you

“The person I’d like to talk about is my grandmother, who I actually lived with for most of my childhood, because both my parents worked long hours. So I know her, well, better than almost anyone. What she did, more than anything, was treat me like an adult very early. From about age eight she’d hand me the shopping list and the money and send me to the market alone, which sounds small, but in a city it isn’t, and I came back feeling about a foot taller every time. She also never let me say ‘I can’t’. If I said it, she’d just wait, in silence, until I tried. I think she influenced me because I’m now someone who assumes most problems can be worked out if you stay with them, and I know exactly where that comes from. She’s eighty-one now and still does her own shopping, and honestly, if I end up half as stubborn as she is, I’ll be happy.”

Describe a time you were late for something

“I want to describe the morning I was late for my final-year viva, which is the oral exam at the end of a degree, so, not something you want to be late for. It was in March, and I’d set two alarms, but the night before there’d been a power cut and my phone had died at about three in the morning, so neither of them went off. I woke up at 9:20 for a 9:30 exam that was forty minutes away. What happened was that I rang my supervisor, who told me, quite calmly, that she’d move me to the last slot of the day, and then I sat in the taxi for forty minutes rehearsing my introduction to the window. In the end it went fine, maybe even better, because I had seven extra hours to worry about it. How I felt at the time was pure panic, but looking back it taught me that being honest and ringing early fixed it, while hiding would have made it a disaster. I charge my phone in a different room now.”

Linking words that keep a long turn moving

Linking words in Part 2 do one job: they signal to the examiner where you are in the talk, which is what “coherence” means in the band descriptors. Use them at the four joints of the talk and nowhere else; sprinkling “moreover” and “furthermore” into a story about your grandmother sounds like an essay.

• Opening: “The person / place / time I’d like to talk about is…”, “I’m going to describe…”
• Moving between bullets: “As for how I know her…”, “Talking about what actually happened…”, “The reason I still use it is…”
• Adding a detail or correcting yourself: “which sounds small, but…”, “well, more precisely…”, “actually, it was closer to…”
• Closing on the feeling: “Looking back…”, “What it taught me was…”, “So that’s why…”

The band-7 descriptor for fluency and coherence in IELTS’s public Speaking band descriptors rewards “flexible use of spoken discourse markers”, meaning the spoken ones above, not written essay connectors.

Timing and the rounding-off questions

Aim to still be talking when the examiner stops you at two minutes, and treat the one or two follow-up questions as a short Part 1. The examiner will interrupt; that is the normal end of Part 2, not a sign that you went wrong. Stopping at one minute is the real risk, because it removes the chance to show you can “readily produce long turns”.

If you run out of material at 1 minute 15, three extensions always work: a second example (“Another time she did something like this was…”), a comparison (“Compared with my other grandparents…”) and the change it made (“The way this still affects me is…”).

The rounding-off questions are short and personal: “Do you still see this person often?”, “Would you recommend this place to a friend?”. Answer in one or two sentences, as you would in Part 1. Do not restart your talk.

Six Part 2 mistakes that cost marks

1. Writing sentences in the minute. You spend 60 seconds on bullet one and then read aloud. Write keywords.
2. A general introduction. “Many people in my country have influential people in their lives.” Thirty seconds gone, nothing specific said. Start with the example.
3. One sentence per bullet. Four bullets, four sentences, 40 seconds, silence. Each bullet needs a detail, a reason and a feeling.
4. Ignoring the tense on the card. “Would like to” answered entirely in the past, or a past event told in the present.
5. Stopping early and asking “Is that enough?” The examiner cannot answer, and the pause counts against fluency. Extend instead.
6. Treating the follow-up questions as a new Part 2. They want one sentence each.

A practice plan for Part 2

One card a day, spoken aloud and recorded, makes Part 2 routine in two weeks. Each session is 15 minutes.

• Days 1–8: one type a day. Take the eight types from the table in order. Give yourself exactly one minute with paper, speak, record, and listen back for the length and for any bullet you skipped.
• Days 9–11: adapt old stories to new cards. Take a card you have not seen and force one of your eight stories onto it. This is what you will do in the exam.
• Day 12: linking-word pass. Replay three recordings and mark every joint between bullets that has no signpost. Re-record.
• Day 13: full timed run. Three cards back to back, one minute of notes each, no replays.
• Day 14: talk to a partner. Answer Part 2 cue cards aloud in StudySes’s IELTS Speaking practice and read the feedback on each answer, or do a full-length mock test so that Part 2 sits between Parts 1 and 3 the way it will on the day. It will not give you a band, but it will show you where you stopped short. Test in the next few days? The IELTS Speaking test next week plan trims this to the essentials.

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