Verdict up front: IELTS Liz remains one of the best free IELTS resources on the internet in 2026 - hundreds of pages of clear lessons, tips and model answers from an experienced teacher. Its one structural limit: it is a library, not a practice tool, so it explains the test but cannot measure you.
Full disclosure: IELTSbiz is our own platform and appears as the recommended companion at the end of this review. That said, we recommend IELTS Liz to candidates without hesitation - the free teaching is genuinely excellent, and this review says so plainly.
What is IELTS Liz?
IELTS Liz is the personal teaching site of Elizabeth - Liz - an experienced, qualified English teacher who has specialised in IELTS preparation since 2008. The site has grown into more than 300 pages of free lessons, tips, model answers and topic lists, alongside a popular YouTube channel of free video lessons.
Everything core is free. The site earns through a small store of paid Advanced Lessons (Writing Task 2 in particular) and e-books, sold at modest one-off prices as of 2026, plus ordinary site advertising.
Who is IELTS Liz for?
Almost everyone, at the understanding stage. If you do not yet know how the test works, what examiners reward at each band, or what a good Task 2 essay actually looks like, IELTS Liz is arguably the best free place on the internet to learn it.
The writing is clear, the advice is current, and the model answers are annotated with real teaching judgment.
It serves less well as your only resource in the practice stage. Reading a hundred excellent pages about the test is not the same as sitting timed questions and finding out which ones you get wrong - and the site, by design, has no mechanism for the second part.
IELTS Liz features
Free lessons across all four skills
The site covers Listening, Reading, Writing and Speaking with dedicated lesson pages per question type and task. The Writing Task 2 material is the deepest: essay types, structures, model answers and common-mistake lists that reflect years of watching real candidates lose real marks.
Model answers and band explanations
The model answers are a highlight - not just samples, but samples with commentary on why they earn their band. The band score pages explain the descriptors in plain language, which is often the missing piece for candidates confused about why their essays score lower than they expect.
Topic lists and current questions
Liz maintains topic and question lists for Speaking and Writing that stay usefully current, which candidates use to rehearse the themes most likely to appear.
Paid Advanced Lessons
The store sells in-depth Advanced Lessons - the best known covers Writing Task 2 - at modest one-off prices as of 2026. They are a fair upgrade for candidates who want the deepest version of her teaching, and buying one is also the natural way to support a site that gives away so much.
IELTS Liz pricing (as of 2026)
| Item | Price (as of 2026) | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| All core lessons, tips, model answers | Free | 300+ pages plus YouTube videos |
| Advanced Lessons (e.g. Writing Task 2) | Modest one-off fee | Optional depth on specific tasks |
| E-books | Modest one-off fee | Ideas, topics and preparation guides |
IELTS Liz pros and cons
Pros
- Outstanding free teaching - clear, current and written for real candidates
- Covers all four skills with per-question-type lessons
- Model answers with genuine teaching commentary
- Trusted, experienced voice - the site has taught candidates since 2008
- No signup, no paywall on the core content
Cons
- No interactive practice - you read about questions rather than answering them under timing
- No feedback on your own writing or answers
- No scoring or progress tracking of any kind
- Site navigation is dense; finding a specific lesson can take some digging
Verdict: 8.5/10
IELTS Liz earns an 8.5/10 - the highest rating we would give any pure content site. As free teaching, it is close to unimprovable: honest, expert, generous. Every candidate should read it, and most should read it early.
The missing points are structural, not qualitative. A library cannot watch you work. It cannot tell you that you specifically keep falling for paraphrase traps in True/False/Not Given, or that your Task Response is the criterion holding your essays at Band 6. Explanation and measurement are different jobs, and IELTS Liz only claims the first.
The best alternative: IELTSbiz
Strictly, IELTSbiz is not an alternative to IELTS Liz - it is the practice layer that a content library needs beside it. Full disclosure again: IELTSbiz is our own platform, so test the free tier and judge for yourself.
Where Liz explains question types, IELTSbiz practice generates Cambridge-style passages by question type and scores you on them - with trap-level feedback on every wrong answer explaining the specific trap that caught you.
Your estimated band is tracked per question type, turning "I read the matching headings lesson" into "my matching headings band moved from 6 to 7".
For Writing, the AI Writing Checker applies the four criteria Liz teaches to your actual essays, instantly and without limit on the paid tier. The engine is validated: IELTSbiz's study of 1,200 essays found AI band scores matched human examiners within ±0.5 bands in 94.2% of cases.
IELTSbiz is free to start with no card; Pro is $6.99/month or $29 lifetime (pricing).
IELTS Liz vs IELTSbiz at a glance
| IELTS Liz | IELTSbiz | |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free (optional paid Advanced Lessons, as of 2026) | Free to start; $6.99/month or $29 lifetime |
| Writing feedback | Model answers to study, no feedback on your essays | AI checker, all four criteria, every essay |
| Reading practice | Strategy lessons and some practice exercises | Unlimited generated passages with trap-level feedback |
| Band tracking | None | Estimated band per question type over time |
| Free tier | Everything core is free | Free daily practice and writing checks, no card |
The recommended combination is simply both: read Liz's lesson on a question type, then run timed IELTSbiz practice on that same type and let the tracking confirm the lesson landed.
Our IELTS Liz alternative page maps that handover in detail, the best IELTS Liz alternatives roundup covers the wider field, and our guide to the best free IELTS practice websites ranks the free options side by side.