IELTS Academic Reading matching features: when you may use any letter more than once

How matching features questions work

You get numbered statements and a short list of lettered options: people, dates, places or products named in the passage. The statements are not necessarily in passage order. If the instruction includes “NB You may use any letter more than once”:

• Each statement has one best option.
• One option may answer several statements.
• Some options may not be used at all.

Four statements, three options: why crossing out fails

A practice passage describes three garden structures: A a water filter, B a seed cabinet and C a shade frame. You must match “works without power”, “has renewable-powered ventilation”, “was designed by residents” and “needs a physical repair”. Four statements and three letters means at least one letter repeats, so crossing out C after the residents statement forces the repair statement onto A or B. Draw a grid instead: one row per option, with the evidence words. Key lines from the passage:

• “The blue water filter cleaned roof runoff before it reached planting beds. It needed weekly inspection but no electricity.”
• “The orange seed cabinet held dry seed packets at a stable temperature; a small solar fan reduced moisture.”

Practice: listen to a feature review

Two reviewers sum up the filter and the shade frame.

No power or renewable power? Match the exact claim

Statements paraphrase the passage, and a near-synonym can change the claim. The filter needed “no electricity”, so it matches “works without power”. The cabinet’s solar fan runs on renewable energy but still uses power, so the cabinet answers “has renewable-powered ventilation”, never “works without power”. Likewise, “weekly inspection” is maintenance, not a repair.

Reference words and reporting verbs

Evidence often sits in a sentence that never names the option: in “It needed weekly inspection but no electricity.”, “It” is the filter from the sentence before. Before matching, name what each pronoun or summary noun points to, as in “The phrase 'this method' refers to the second trial.”

Also check:

• “the former” and “the latter”: the first and second of two things just mentioned.
• Reporting verbs: “Researchers speculate about the cause of the colour change.” means the cause is unproven, so it cannot match a statement with “proved”.

Headings, information or features? Name the task first

The three matching tasks need different first steps:

• Matching headings: sum up the paragraph’s main idea in about six words, then compare. There are always more headings than paragraphs, and a shared word proves nothing: a paragraph opening “The greatest cost was not broken tools but volunteer time …” needs “Recorded guidance reduces repeated work”, not “The history of broken equipment”.
• Matching information (“Which paragraph contains the following information?”): scan for a distinctive cue such as a number or name, then read the whole sentence. A paragraph may hold two answers or none.
• Matching features: track which option owns each claim, keeping used letters available when allowed.

Mistakes that cost marks

Label every wrong answer in practice with one cause:

• Crossing out a letter you could reuse.
• Choosing an option named near a keyword without reading the sentence.
• Treating renewable power as no power.
• Giving “it” or “this” to the wrong option.
• Picking a heading that fits one detail, not the paragraph.

A 25-minute exam routine

Three or four times a week, with one practice passage:

• Circle the reuse note and write the option names beside the letters.
• Answer the questions in 20 minutes.
• Underline the evidence words for every answer.
• Check with the key and label each mistake from the list above.
• Write one new statement that an already used option answers.

What comes next

Next, try summary completion, where you copy words from the passage within a limit, and Yes, No, Not Given questions on the writer’s views. Both reward one piece of evidence per answer.