Describe a podcast or radio programme you listen to
An audio card, which means the when matters more than for any other media topic — listening is something you do while doing something else.
The cue card
Describe a podcast or radio programme you listen to.
You should say
- what it is
- when you listen to it
- what it covers
- and explain why you find it worth your time
1 minute to prepare · up to 2 minutes to speak
How to fill the two minutes
Four beats, not four answers. The prompts on the card are a scaffold — a turn that flows past them scores better than four disconnected replies.
- What it is and what it covers.
- When and where you listen — commuting, cooking, walking, falling asleep.
- The format: interviews, a host, guests, how long an episode runs.
- Why audio rather than reading or watching the same material.
Vocabulary this card invites
Lexical Resource is a quarter of your band, and band 7 explicitly allows the occasional wrong word — playing it safe with plain vocabulary is what keeps people at 6.
an episode drops
current idiom for a new release
in the background
for listening while doing something else
the host
and 'a guest' — get the roles named correctly
I've listened to the whole back catalogue
concrete evidence of enthusiasm
it makes the journey go quicker
the honest, natural reason
informative
and 'a bit rambling' for the balanced view
The trap on this card
Describing the subject matter and never the programme.
The card is about a thing you listen to. Format, voices, length, when you press play — that's the description being asked for.
A band 8 answer, and why it works
Read this to see the moves, not to learn the words. An examiner hears memorised answers every working day and it shows up in your fluency score — the hesitation pattern of someone reciting is nothing like the pattern of someone thinking. The details below are invented; yours should be your own.
The podcast I listen to most is an interview show where the host talks to one person for about two hours, which sounds excessive and is the entire appeal. Most interviews are twenty minutes and everybody stays on their prepared answers for twenty minutes. At two hours people run out of material and start actually thinking, and there's usually a point around ninety minutes where the conversation becomes genuinely interesting. I listen while walking or cooking, generally one episode across several days. What I've noticed is that I've become much more interested in guests I'd never have chosen — I've listened to episodes about subjects I'd have said I had no interest in and been gripped, which has made me suspicious of my own sense of what I find interesting. The host is also unusually willing to say he doesn't understand something, which I think is the whole skill. Most interviewers won't, and the audience learns nothing as a result.
What earns the band
- The observation about people running out of prepared material is a genuine insight into the format.
- 'Made me suspicious of my own sense of what I find interesting' is self-reflective in a way that is difficult to fabricate.
- It identifies a specific skill in the host and explains why it matters, which is real evaluation rather than praise.
What Part 3 asks next
Part 3 is loosely tied to your long turn, but the questions turn abstract — about people in general rather than about you. This card usually leads into:
- why audio has become popular again
- whether listening teaches as effectively as reading
- how media habits differ between generations
Other media & culture cards
Describe a film you enjoyed watching.
Same discipline as the book card — plot summary is the trap, response is the answer.
Describe a song or piece of music you like.
Music is hard to describe and that's the opportunity — most candidates give up and talk about the artist instead.
Describe a website you use often.
Pick one with a purpose. 'Google' and 'YouTube' are the answers that give you least to say.
Describe a television programme you like.
Series give you more material than films — format, running length, how it changed over time.
Describe an interesting piece of news you read or heard about.
Choose something you actually understood. A story you half-followed will strand you at ninety seconds.
Speak this one out loud
Oliver will read you a card, wait out your preparation minute, and then say nothing at all for two minutes — which is the part you cannot rehearse alone. The report afterwards scores fluency, vocabulary, grammar and pronunciation separately. The first test is free.
This guide is written from the published IELTS Speaking band descriptors, in our own words. For the official wording, see the British Council's band descriptors. MockLive AI is an independent practice tool and is not affiliated with IELTS, the British Council, IDP or Cambridge University Press & Assessment.