IELTS Liz Review 2026: Still the Best Free IELTS Site?
IELTS Liz is a beloved free IELTS resource by teacher Liz, with lessons, tips and model answers. Why it remains essential, its honest limits, and how Band9Prep complements it as a practice layer.
Band9Prep Team
IELTS Preparation Experts
A note on tone before we begin: IELTS Liz deserves respect. Long before AI feedback existed, Liz — an experienced teacher — published hundreds of free lessons that carried countless candidates to their target bands, asking nothing in return. This review is written as appreciation with honest boundaries, not as a takedown.
The question for 2026 is narrower: what does IELTS Liz still do better than anyone, and what do you need alongside it?
A second disclosure: free teacher sites do not publish pricing tiers or score statistics to evaluate, so this review sticks to what is publicly observable — the lessons, model answers and teaching approach — and to the structural limits every static content library shares. No invented claims, just a fair accounting of a resource the whole IELTS community respects.
What Is IELTS Liz?
IELTS Liz is a free IELTS preparation website offering lessons, exam tips, model answers and technique guidance across Listening, Reading, Writing and Speaking. Its style is plain-spoken teacher advice: what the question wants, how to structure your answer, and which mistakes cost bands.
Its influence is hard to overstate — for years it has been among the most recommended free resources in IELTS forums and study groups, particularly for Writing Task 2 structure and Speaking Part 2 technique.
For orientation on the wider ecosystem, see our best IELTS platforms 2026 and alternatives guide.
Genuine Strengths
Free, genuinely free. The core lessons cost nothing. For candidates who cannot afford courses — and IELTS test fees already strain many budgets — that accessibility is a public good, not just a feature.
Teacher-quality explanations. Liz writes like someone who has marked thousands of scripts: concrete, specific, and alert to the exact misunderstandings students have. Her essay-structure guidance alone has probably earned more Band 7s than any single paid product.
Model answers to learn from. Worked examples with commentary teach pattern recognition — what a good introduction does, where cohesion comes from, how Part 3 answers extend. Reading ten analysed models teaches more than reading a hundred unmarked ones.
Honest, hype-free advice. No score guarantees, no "secret tricks," no upsell pressure in the learning flow. The site tells you the boring truth: understand the criteria, practise deliberately, manage time. That honesty builds correct expectations.
Excellent starting point for self-studiers. A beginner who works through the lessons end-to-end arrives at their first mock test understanding the test — which makes every later hour of practice more productive.
Genuine Limits
No personal feedback. This is the fundamental boundary of all static content. IELTS Liz can show you a Band 9 essay; it cannot tell you why your essay is Band 6.5. Productive skills improve on judged output, and a website cannot judge.
No timed mocks or analytics. Knowing the method and executing it in 60 minutes with a racing clock are different skills. There is no full-exam simulation, no timing data, no weakness tracking — all of which modern prep layers provide.
Static in a changing test. Free content libraries update slowly. Question trends, computer-delivered quirks and current Speaking topics move faster than any solo teacher's archive. Pair classic lessons with current material.
Self-diagnosis burden. Without feedback, learners misjudge themselves — usually overrating Writing ("my essay looks like the model") while missing invisible problems like task response gaps. External assessment corrects this.
| Strengths | Limits |
|---|---|
| Completely free core lessons | No essay or speaking feedback |
| Experienced-teacher explanations | No timed full mocks or analytics |
| Analysed model answers | Content updates slowly |
| Honest, hype-free guidance | Learners must self-diagnose weaknesses |
| Ideal foundation before practising | No study plan tracking or reminders |
Pricing (General Terms Only)
IELTS Liz's website lessons are free — that is the point. If the teacher offers any books or extended materials separately, those are typically positioned at a budget-friendly tier. There is no subscription to evaluate, which makes Liz the default starting resource regardless of budget. Check the official site for anything beyond the free library.
Who Should Pick IELTS Liz?
- Every budget-conscious candidate — there is no reason not to use the best free resource available.
- Beginners who need the test explained clearly before spending money on anything.
- Writing-structure learners working from Band 5.5–6.5 toward reliable essay organisation.
- Self-studiers who want a trusted reference to consult throughout prep.
Everyone, eventually, needs something Liz cannot give: judgment on their own output. Our exam-day guide shows what timed performance demands.
For the direct comparison, see Band9Prep vs IELTS Liz.
How to Study With IELTS Liz (the Lesson-to-Practice Loop)
Free lessons only pay off inside a disciplined loop, so run this cycle for every topic. Step one: study the lesson actively — not skimmed, but noted. After reading her guidance on, say, Discussion essays, close the page and write the structure from memory: introduction formula, paragraph purposes, conclusion move. If you cannot reproduce it, you did not learn it.
Step two: imitate before you innovate. Take one of her model answers and dissect it paragraph by paragraph — what job does each sentence do? Then write your own essay on a different question using the same skeleton. Beginners should do this five or six times per essay type; imitation is how structure becomes instinct.
Step three: get your imitation judged. This is the step Liz cannot do for you, so export it: submit the essay for criterion-level feedback, noting specifically whether your task response and cohesion match the model's standard. Log the gap ("my main ideas lack extension") and reread the relevant Liz lesson with that gap in mind — second readings land completely differently once you have failed at the skill.
Repeat the loop per weakness, and sit a full mock every two weeks to confirm lesson knowledge is surviving time pressure. Lessons in, judged practice out, mocks to verify — that rhythm turns a free website into a complete education.
Verdict: Learn From Liz, Practise Elsewhere
Is IELTS Liz still the best free IELTS site? For taught lessons at zero cost — yes, comfortably. Nothing paid replaces what gratitude the IELTS community owes this resource, and every candidate should work through it.
But learning the method is half the journey. Use IELTS Liz as your teacher and Band9Prep as your practice layer: study the lesson, then immediately write the essay or speak the answer under timed conditions and get instant AI feedback. Free wisdom in, judged reps out — that combination is how bands rise.