Passive voice in IELTS Writing: when to use it and when not to

The passive voice is one of the first structures candidates are told to “add” to their Writing, and one of the first they overuse. It is neither a mark of a high band nor a fault. It is a tool with a job, and this guide is about the job. It sits inside the wider criterion covered in the guide to Grammatical Range and Accuracy, and it assumes you know the shape of the test from the guide to the Writing format for Task 1 and Task 2.

What the criterion asks of grammar

IELTS.org lists Grammatical Range and Accuracy as one of the four Writing criteria, weighted equally, and a task’s score is the average of the four. This site’s Writing band descriptors explorer puts the public descriptors for the criterion in plain words. At band 6, simple and complex sentences are both present, and mistakes rarely stop a reader from understanding. At band 7, you use several kinds of complex structure, and whole sentences with no error are frequent.

Nothing in those descriptors names the passive. IELTS does not publish a list of structures to use, and it does not say how many passives an essay should hold. So the useful question is not “have I used the passive?” but “does this sentence need it, and is it correct?”

When the passive fits

A Task 1 process

A process diagram shows what happens to a material, and usually nobody is named. The agent is unknown or unimportant, so the passive keeps the material in the subject position:

• The clay is dug from the ground and crushed.
• The mixture is then shaped in moulds.

Both sentences are invented illustrations. They answer “what happens next?” without inventing a worker the diagram never shows. The guide to process diagrams and maps uses the passive in its worked example, along with the sequence words that connect stages.

A formal Task 2 sentence with no actor to name

Some claims are about a state of affairs, not a person: “Public transport is underfunded in many cities”, “Recycling should be encouraged”. Naming an actor for each would add words and no meaning. IELTS.org asks for an academic or semi-formal and neutral style on Task 2, and the passive gives a neutral tone when the actor really does not matter.

When the passive hurts

The agent is the point

If the doer is what the argument is about, say so. “Governments should fund this” is stronger than “This should be funded”, because it takes a position on who. A passive that hides the answer to “by whom?” lets the claim drift, and a marker who reads a task response for position may notice.

A passive with no clear agent where one is needed

“Mistakes were made” is a sentence that avoids saying who made them. In an essay, the same device reads as evasion. When you notice yourself writing “it is believed” or “it has been shown”, ask who believes it, and who showed it.

Stacked passives

Stacked passives slow a sentence down:

Invented, heavy: “It is expected that the system will be expanded so that more passengers can be served.”

Invented, clearer: “The city expects to expand the system and serve more passengers.”

The second version has one agent, two active verbs and fewer words. A reader who must unpack a sentence spends effort better spent on your ideas.

Trend description in Task 1

For a line graph or a bar chart, the language of change is active and intransitive: “sales rose”, “the figure peaked”, “numbers fell sharply”. Forcing a passive (“an increase was seen”) adds nothing. The guide to charts, graphs and tables covers the verbs and nouns that suit data.

Forming the passive across tenses

The passive is a form of “be” plus a past participle. The tense is carried by “be”. The invented examples below use one verb, “produce”, so you can see only the tense change.

A process diagram nearly always wants the present simple. A past diagram, such as a map from an earlier decade, wants the past simple. The next guide in this cluster, on verb tenses in Task 1 and Task 2, shows how to choose between them from the visual and from the question.

Only transitive verbs have a passive, because the subject of a passive sentence is the object of the active one. “Happen”, “occur”, “rise” and “fall” do not take an object, so “was happened” and “was risen” are errors. If a verb cannot answer “what did it do to something?”, it has no passive.

The impersonal passive

The impersonal passive introduces a view without naming who holds it: “It is often argued that”, “It is widely believed that”, “It has been suggested that”. It is a standard way to open a Task 2 paragraph that discusses an opinion, and you will see the pattern in many essays.

It works best when the next sentence does something with the view, either supporting it or answering it:

Invented: “It is often argued that children should start school later. This view rests on the idea that younger children cope badly with long days, but the evidence is mixed.”

The second sentence names “this view” and moves on. The impersonal passive is a way in, not a place to stay. Keep your own position in active sentences, such as “I agree that” or “In my view”.

Common errors

A missing “be”

The most frequent slip is a participle with no auxiliary, which leaves a sentence without a proper verb. Check that every passive sentence has a form of “be” before the participle.

Wrong: “The bricks dried in the sun.”

Right: “The bricks are dried in the sun.”

Without “are”, the first sentence is an active past sentence, and the process diagram has moved into the past.

A wrong participle

Irregular verbs trip many candidates. “Was wrote”, “was teached”, “has been grew” and “is begun to” are all errors in form. Keep a short list of the irregular participles you actually use in Writing (“built”, “made”, “taken”, “shown”, “grown”, “begun”) and check them in your proofreading.

A wrong tense of “be”

“The factory has been closed in 2015” mixes a present perfect with a past date. With a date, use the past: “The factory was closed in 2015.” Without a date, “has been closed” is right. This is a tense error that happens to sit in a passive.

The passive of a verb that has none

“The number was risen” and “Prices were fallen” are the intransitive error described above. Use the active: “The number rose.”

Test your own text

Four checks you can run on any answer in a few minutes:

1. Underline every passive. For each, ask whether the actor is unknown, unimportant or already clear. If it is none of those, try the active.
2. Check that each one has a form of “be” and a correct participle.
3. Look for two passives in one sentence and split or rewrite it.
4. In Task 2, find every impersonal passive and check that the sentence after it does something with the view.

The essay checker on this site checks the shape of a Task 2 essay in your browser. It is not a band score and cannot judge your grammar, so use it for structure, and use the checks above for the sentences.

Where the passive sits among your other structures

Treat the passive as one of several structures you choose between, next to the ones that join clauses and the ones that add detail. The linking words guide covers how sentences connect, and the guides on relative clauses and complex sentences cover the structures that build longer sentences. The Speaking side of grammar, including how tenses go wrong when you narrate, is in the post on common grammar mistakes in IELTS Speaking.

A last habit helps more than any rule. When you proofread, name each sentence’s subject. If it is a thing acted on, the passive fits. If it is a person or group who acts, the active is probably better.