Three words at the bottom of your letter could be costing you an entire band score — and most candidates have no idea. Getting your IELTS letter endings wrong is one of the fastest ways to lose marks in General Training Task 1, because the closing phrase is direct evidence of whether you have maintained a consistent register from start to finish. Examiners read it last, and it colours their impression of everything that came before.
This guide covers every closing phrase you need to know, the one rule that ties them all together, the seven mistakes candidates make most often, and a quick-reference table you can review right up to exam day.
Why Letter Endings Matter for Your Band Score
IELTS General Training Task 1 is assessed on four criteria: Task Achievement, Coherence and Cohesion, Lexical Resource, and Grammatical Range and Accuracy. Register — the level of formality appropriate to the situation — cuts across all four.
When an examiner reads your letter, they are looking for consistency of register from the first word to the last. The closing phrase is literally the last thing the examiner reads. If you open with “Dear Sir or Madam” and close with “Lots of love”, you have signalled to the examiner that you do not fully control register. That is a Lexical Resource and Task Achievement issue simultaneously.
Specifically, a register mismatch in the closing:
- Suggests limited awareness of how English varies across social contexts
- Disrupts the overall coherence of the letter
- Can pull a Band 7 response down to a Band 6 or lower under Task Achievement if the purpose and tone feel inconsistent
The good news: the rules governing letter endings are simple and learnable. Once you know them, applying them correctly takes no extra time at all.
The Golden Rule: Your Ending Must Match Your Opening
Before looking at individual phrases, internalise this single principle:
The register of your closing phrase must match the register of your opening salutation and the overall tone of the letter.
Opening and closing are a pair. You cannot mix a formal opening with a casual closing, or an informal opening with a stiff, corporate-sounding sign-off. The IELTS task prompt will tell you who you are writing to — use that to determine register, then apply it uniformly from “Dear…” to the final line.
Formal Letter Endings
Formal letters are written to people you do not know personally, or to institutions, organisations, and authority figures. In IELTS prompts, this typically means letters to a manager, an employer, a local council, a landlord you have never met, a newspaper editor, or a company.
Yours sincerely vs Yours faithfully — the rule most candidates get wrong
These two phrases are not interchangeable. In formal British English — which IELTS follows — there is a strict convention:
- “Yours sincerely” — use this when you have addressed the person by name in the opening (e.g., “Dear Mr Johnson”, “Dear Ms Chen”)
- “Yours faithfully” — use this when you have opened with “Dear Sir or Madam” (i.e., you do not know the recipient’s name)
A simple way to remember it: if you know the name, be sincere; if you don’t, be faithful.
Both of these are correct in IELTS. Neither is better than the other — what matters is that you pair them correctly with the right salutation.
What to write after the formal closing
After “Yours sincerely” or “Yours faithfully”, drop one line and write your name. In a formal context, using a full name (first name + last name) is conventional and appropriate. You may write just your first name if the context suggests you have an existing professional relationship, but in most IELTS scenarios — where you are writing to someone you do not know — a full name signals professionalism.
Example:
Yours sincerely,
Maria Gonzalez
Semi-Formal Letter Endings
Semi-formal letters occupy the middle ground. You are writing to someone you know in a professional context — a colleague, a manager you work with regularly, a teacher you are on good terms with — or to someone in an institution where the relationship is respectful but not entirely impersonal.
Appropriate semi-formal closings include:
- “Kind regards” — the most versatile semi-formal closing; suitable for most professional contexts where you want to sound warm but professional
- “Best regards” — slightly warmer than “Kind regards”; appropriate when you have a positive, ongoing relationship with the recipient
- “With best wishes” — slightly softer; suitable when the tone of the letter itself is supportive or encouraging
What to write after a semi-formal closing
A first name is generally appropriate here. A full name is also acceptable and errs on the side of professionalism.
Example:
Kind regards,
David
Informal Letter Endings
Informal letters are written to people you know well: a friend, a family member, or in some prompts, a flatmate or childhood acquaintance. The prompt will usually make this explicit (“Write a letter to your friend…”).
Common informal closings you can use in IELTS:
- “All the best” — warm, friendly, and universally appropriate for informal letters to friends; this is probably the safest and most natural-sounding informal close
- “Take care” — slightly more personal; works well when the letter has a supportive or concerned tone
- “See you soon” — natural and conversational; works well if the letter’s context involves an upcoming visit or reunion
- “Best wishes” — sits at the informal-to-semi-formal border; safe for a friend you are not extremely close to
- “Lots of love” — reserved for family members or very close friends; do not use this for a general “friend” prompt unless the relationship described in the task is clearly intimate
What to write after an informal closing
In informal letters, use your first name only. Signing with a full name in an informal letter feels stilted and unnatural — it would strike an examiner as a register inconsistency just as surely as a mismatched closing phrase would.
Example:
All the best,
James
Quick-Reference Guide: Opening to Closing
Use this table as a revision reference. Match your opening to the appropriate closing column, then sign with the name format shown.
| Situation | Opening | Appropriate Closing | Name to Sign |
|---|---|---|---|
| Formal — name unknown | Dear Sir or Madam | Yours faithfully | Full name |
| Formal — name known | Dear Mr Smith / Dear Ms Lee | Yours sincerely | Full name |
| Semi-formal — professional relationship | Dear David / Dear Professor Khan | Kind regards / Best regards / With best wishes | First name or full name |
| Informal — friend or acquaintance | Dear Sarah / Hi Tom | All the best / Take care / See you soon / Best wishes | First name only |
| Informal — close family | Dear Mum / Dear Uncle Raj | Lots of love / All my love / Take care | First name only |
Common Mistakes IELTS Candidates Make
Even well-prepared candidates make errors here. These are the most frequent problems examiners see:
1. Using “Yours sincerely” after “Dear Sir or Madam” This is the single most common formal letter mistake. If you do not know the name, it must be “Yours faithfully”.
2. Using “Yours faithfully” after addressing the person by name The reverse error. If you wrote “Dear Ms Thompson”, closing with “Yours faithfully” is incorrect.
3. Mixing formal and informal registers throughout, then using the wrong close Candidates sometimes write a formal opening, drift into casual language in the body, and end with “Take care” or “Cheers”. Each of these is a separate register error, and they compound each other.
4. Using “Cheers” or “Thanks” “Cheers” is very informal British slang and is not appropriate in IELTS letters at any register level. “Thanks” alone as a closing is incomplete — it is not a standard letter ending.
5. Skipping the closing entirely Some candidates, under time pressure, omit the closing phrase altogether. This is a Task Achievement issue. Always leave time for it — it takes five seconds to write and costs real marks if missing.
6. Over-formal closings in informal letters Writing “Yours sincerely” to a friend sounds robotic and strange. It signals that you have not understood the register requirement, even if every other part of the letter is perfect.
7. Signing with a full name in an informal letter This is a subtler error but still signals register unawareness. A letter to a friend signed “Maria Gonzalez” feels cold and office-like.
A Note on Register Throughout the Letter
Getting the closing right is important, but it is only effective when the rest of the letter is consistent. Register runs through your vocabulary choices, sentence structure, level of directness, and use of contractions. In a formal letter, you avoid contractions (“I am writing” not “I’m writing”) and use more complex, distanced phrasing. In an informal letter, contractions are natural and expected.
If you want a deeper understanding of why IELTS writing preparation is fundamentally different from other exam skills — and why register control is at the heart of it — read our guide on what makes IELTS writing preparation different.
Final Tip
Think of your letter’s opening and closing as bookends. They frame everything in between, and they must match each other in weight and style. Before you submit your answer, do a ten-second register check:
- Look at your opening salutation — is it formal, semi-formal, or informal?
- Look at your closing phrase — does it belong in the same register?
- Check your signed name — is it first name only (informal) or full name (formal/semi-formal)?
If all three align, your letter’s register is consistent. That consistency is exactly what examiners are looking for, and it is one of the simplest ways to protect — and improve — your Task 1 band score.