Images to describe in English for B1 Preliminary

In this article, I bring you images to describe in English and practise for your exam. Practise with these images and the examples of descriptions.

One of the most common tasks in English exams is describing images. In fact, in the B1 Preliminary (PET) from Cambridge Assessment English, Part 2 consists exactly of describing a photo in English, which I have already discussed on other occasions, I have even recorded a comprehensive video that I will leave for you at the end of this article.

However, one of the problems I see many students have is that, despite having the resources or the knowledge to describe photos, they don’t know which images to describe. Therefore, in today’s article, I bring you lots of images to describe in English, so you can practise as much as you want and more in preparation for your exam. 🙂

Requirements for a good image to describe

Before starting with the images, I want to talk about the characteristics that an image must have to be good for practice. That is, not just any image will do, as some images have more value than others depending on what they offer to the person who has to describe them, especially when we are talking about intermediate or low levels, such as B1 level.

To choose an image to describe in English, it must have the following characteristics:

• It must be a real photo, not just an image or a montage.
• It must show people, more than one if possible.
• The people should not be looking at the camera.
• Represent a scene, that is, an action you can describe.
• Avoid controversial or potentially offensive scenes.
• It must show a colloquial scene, something that can feel familiar to everyone.

In general, these should be the tips to follow when choosing a photo to describe in English. Let’s now look at two bad examples of types of photos you should not choose, and I will explain why.

Bad Example 1

Why is this a bad example of a photo? For several reasons:

• It shows only one person.
• The person is looking at the camera.
• The person is wearing very few clothes. Yes, I know this may seem exaggerated, but Cambridge, for example, doesn’t choose photos of people wearing very few clothes because they can be offensive to certain people, especially cultures where women are more covered.
• The scene is very poor, there isn’t much to talk about.

Bad Example 2

Obviously, this image is a bad example because:

• No action is happening.
• It doesn’t show people.

Examples of photos to describe

Images of sports to describe

In this picture I can see two children playing with a ball in the park. There’s a boy and a girl, who must be around eleven years old. The boy is standing on the left while the girl is standing on the right. In the middle, on the grass, there’s a football. Both of them are trying to kick the ball at the same time.

The boy is wearing a white T-shirt, a light blue shirt, dark blue trousers and brown shoes, and the girl is wearing short denim overalls, a red T-shirt and white trainers.

It seems like the weather is great. It must be summer or spring, because they are wearing short sleeves. In the background we can see a lot of trees. It might be a small forest or just some of the trees at the park.

In this picture we can see two people walking or jogging at the park. They’re young people, a man and the woman, and they are wearing sports clothes. They are both wearing shorts and white trainers, but the man is wearing a green T-shirt, whereas the woman is wearing a blue T-shirt. Also, the young, blonde man has a towel over his neck.

They seem to be enjoying the exercise, because both of them are smiling. Probably, they are siblings or, maybe, a couple trying to get fit.

I believe they are running in a kind of park because in the background there are many trees and bushes, and on the sides of the path there is green grass. As for the weather, it seems good, as they are wearing short sleeves and it isn’t raining.

This picture shows a family playing basketball in basketball court. We can see the parents and two daughters.

They are all wearing sports clothes and they seem to be enjoing themselves, at least the parents. I say so because they are smiling. The older daughter is standing on the right and she is holding a ball. Maybe she’s going to pass the ball to her dad or she’s going to try to score.

I think it must be the weekend because that’s normally when families have time to spend together. It seems like a beautiful sunny day and they are making the most of it.

In the background there are other people doing sport, so it might be an outdoor sports centre or something like that.

Photos to describe of food

Photos to describe of family

I recommend you take a look at this post about family vocabulary in English and Spanish.

More photos to describe in English

If you want more examples of images to describe, don’t worry. I’ve taken the time to select perfect images for people like you who are looking for perfect photos to describe in English and practise for exams like Cambridge B1.

VIDEO: How to describe an image in English

In the following video, I explain exactly how to describe a photo in English, and more specifically, how it’s done for the Cambridge B1 Preliminary exam. I hope it’s very useful for you!