TOEFL Writing: the three 2026 tasks
Three short tasks, each scored on doing a specific job — not on essay length. The fastest gains come from covering the prompt completely, not from writing more.
The 2026 TOEFL Writing section runs about 23 minutes and has three tasks: Build a Sentence (about 10 items in roughly 6 minutes), Write an Email (7 minutes, covering every bullet in the prompt, with official samples around 150 words) and Write for an Academic Discussion (about 10 minutes, 100 words minimum, samples nearer 200). The independent essay and the integrated read-listen-write task were both removed.
The three tasks
| Task | Time | Length | Scored on |
|---|---|---|---|
| Build a Sentence | about 6 min for ~10 items | One sentence each | Word order and grammatical accuracy — machine-scorable. |
| Write an Email | 7 min | Samples ≈150 words | Covering every bullet, register, and organisation. |
| Write for an Academic Discussion | about 10 min | 100 words minimum; samples ≈200 | A clear position, real support, coherence and language. |
The Email: cover every bullet or lose the mark
The prompt lists what your email must do — usually two or three things. Missing one bullet costs more than any amount of stylistic polish gains. In seven minutes the winning routine is: one line of purpose, one short paragraph per bullet, one closing line, sign off.
- Open with why you are writing, in one sentence.
- Give each bullet its own sentence or two — in the order the prompt lists them, so a reader can check them off.
- Match the register to the recipient. A housing office is not a friend.
- Close and sign. An unfinished email reads as an unfinished task.
The Academic Discussion: take a side in the first sentence
You are joining a discussion thread, not writing an essay. The strongest openings state a position immediately and then earn it. Hedging across both sides is the most common way to land under band 4 with otherwise clean English — a discussion contribution that never contributes reads as evasive.
- Sentence one: your position, unambiguously.
- Then a reason, and a concrete example or consequence for it.
- Then engage with what has already been said — agree with a qualification, or push back specifically.
- One hundred words is the floor, not the target. Around 200 is what strong samples look like.
Ten short items, mechanically scored, on ordinary sentence patterns. It is the one part of Writing that improves purely with drilling, and it takes minutes a day. Skipping it because it looks trivial leaves band on the table.
Practise the 2026 format, not the old one
Every task type in the current test, a full explanation on every question, and a band estimate that shows where your next half band comes from.
Frequently asked questions
Is there still a TOEFL essay?
Not in the old sense. The independent 300-word essay and the integrated read-listen-write task were both removed in 2026. Writing is now Build a Sentence, an email, and an academic discussion post.
How many words should the TOEFL email be?
There is no fixed count, but official samples run to about 150 words. What is scored is whether you covered every bullet in the prompt, in the right register — not the word count.
How long is the Academic Discussion task?
About ten minutes. The minimum is 100 words; strong official samples run nearer 200.
How is TOEFL Writing scored?
On the same 1.0–6.0 band scale as every other section, against ETS rubrics covering task fulfilment, organisation, language and register. PrepScore grades your drafts on those dimensions and returns a band with sentence-level feedback.
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