DELF B1 Writing Sample Paper With a Marked Model

DELF B1 writing is one task. One page. Forty-five minutes. Twenty-five marks.

That simplicity is deceptive. Five criteria are assessed, and only one of them is about your ideas. The other four cover organization, register, vocabulary, and grammar. Candidates who write a thoughtful opinion in messy paragraphs still lose ten marks.

So this page does something different. It gives you a model answer, then marks it in front of you, criterion by criterion, so you can see where the marks are earned.

Most candidates prepare writing alongside the oral, since both require a defended opinion. DELF B1 speaking papers cover the spoken version of the same skill.

What Does the DELF B1 Writing Task Look Like?

A single task in 45 minutes, worth 25 marks. You express a personal attitude on a general topic in about 160 words. The format may be an essay, a letter, or a contribution to a forum or magazine.

You are always given a situation. Who you are, who you are writing to, and why. That framing matters, because the register you choose is worth 5 marks on its own.

The paper sits with listening and reading in a collective session of one hour and fifty-five minutes. Reading also takes 45 minutes at this level, so pacing across the session matters. You need 50 out of 100 overall and at least 5 out of 25 here. The official specification is on the France Éducation International B1 diploma page.

Which Three Task Types Can You Be Given?

Three formats recur: a forum or website contribution, a letter to a person or organization, and an article for a magazine or newsletter. All three ask for an opinion supported by examples.

• The forum post. You respond to an online discussion. Informal to neutral register, direct address to other readers, and usually the easiest of the three.
• The letter. You write to a landlord, a mayor, a school, a colleague, or a friend. The register depends entirely on the addressee, and the layout must look like a letter.
• The article. You write for a student magazine or association newsletter. A neutral register, a title, and a clear structure are expected.

The content approach is the same for all three. What changes are layout and formality? Get the wrong text type, and the anomalies rule bites, which we cover below.

This page is the marked mock. For the syllabus, common topics, and full evaluation criteria, see the DELF B1 writing guide.

The Sample Paper

Production écrite : 25 points

Vous vivez en France depuis un an. Sur le forum du site de votre ville, vous lisez ce message :

« Notre municipalité veut interdire les voitures dans le centre-ville le week-end. Pour moi, c’est une très mauvaise idée : les commerçants vont perdre des clients et les personnes âgées ne pourront plus se déplacer. »

Vous répondez à ce message. Vous donnez votre opinion sur cette mesure et vous proposez des solutions. (160 mots minimum)

Model answer (174 words)

Un centre-ville sans voitures : une bonne idée à condition de l’organiser

Bonjour,

Je comprends vos inquiétudes, mais je ne partage pas votre avis. Je pense que fermer le centre aux voitures le week-end serait une bonne chose pour tout le monde.

D’abord, l’air serait plus propre et les rues plus agréables. J’habite près de la place du marché et le samedi, il y a tellement de circulation qu’on ne peut pas marcher tranquillement. Dans ma ville d’origine, une rue piétonne a été créée il y a trois ans et les gens y passent maintenant beaucoup plus de temps.

Ensuite, je ne crois pas que les commerçants perdraient des clients. Au contraire, quand les gens marchent, ils regardent les vitrines et ils entrent plus facilement dans les magasins.

Cependant, vous avez raison sur un point important : les personnes âgées et les personnes handicapées doivent pouvoir venir en centre-ville.

C’est pourquoi je propose deux solutions : des navettes gratuites depuis les parkings et des autorisations spéciales pour les personnes à mobilité réduite.

Qu’en pensez-vous ?

Marie

How Do Correctors Award the 25 Marks?

Five criteria worth 5 marks each: task completion, coherence and cohesion, social appropriateness, vocabulary, and grammar. Each is banded at 0, 1, 3, or 5, and two correctors mark independently.

The full descriptors are published in the official B1 written production grid.

The model answer, marked

Task completion: 5 of 5. The task asked for two things: an opinion and proposed solutions. Both appear. The opinion is stated in the second line, and two concrete solutions appear near the end. The B1+ descriptor asks for concrete examples and a simple line of argument. The pedestrian street from the writer’s hometown is exactly that.

Coherence and cohesion, 5 of 5. Look at the connectors. D’abord, Ensuite, Cependant, C’est pourquoi. Four different ones, each opening a paragraph. Now look at the layout. Six short paragraphs, one idea each, with a title and a sign-off. The B1+ descriptor mentions page layout and punctuation directly, and most candidates never realize that these are marked.

Social appropriateness, 3 of 5. A forum post to strangers takes a neutral register, and the model uses vous correctly. It stays polite while disagreeing, which is the hard part. It sits at 3 rather than 5 because the tone is slightly uneven, opening formally and closing with a casual “Qu’en pensez-vous ?”.

Vocabulary, 5 of 5. Circulation, rue piétonne, vitrines, navettes, mobilité réduite. That is a range beyond daily life, on a social topic, which is what the top band asks for. Spelling is clean.

Grammar, 3 of 5. Present, conditional, and passive all appear, and the conditional forms are correct. It sits at 3 because complex structures are limited in variety, which is exactly what the B1 descriptor describes. Reaching 5 needs a wider range of complex forms used accurately.

Total: 21 of 25. A strong pass, and the two lost bands show what B1+ really demands. No better ideas. More range and steadier register.

Marking scripts week after week, the criterion that surprises students most is coherence. They expect to be judged on ideas and grammar. Almost nobody expects paragraph breaks and punctuation to be worth five marks. Once a group sees a marked script laid out like the one above, layout stops being an afterthought, which is exactly why we mark scripts in front of the class rather than returning them silently.

Why Does Layout Carry Marks?

Coherence and cohesion are worth 5 marks, and the descriptor names page layout and punctuation. A wall of text loses marks even when the French is correct.

Four habits protect that band:

1. Write in short paragraphs. One idea each. Leave a blank line between them. Four to six paragraphs for 160 words is right.
2. Open each paragraph with a connector. D’abord, Ensuite, De plus, Cependant, C’est pourquoi, Enfin. Vary them. Repeating “et puis” three times caps you at the middle band.
3. Add a title if the format allows. Articles and forum posts benefit. Letters do not need one.
4. Use the layout of the text type. A letter needs a greeting, paragraphs, and a sign-off. A forum post needs a greeting and a name. An article needs a title and paragraphs.

Punctuation counts too. Commas before mais, no space before a full stop, and the French convention of a space before question marks and colons. These are small, and they add up in the corrector’s impression.

Which Grammar Structures Lift You to B1+?

The grammar band separates candidates who use complex structures accurately from those who only attempt them. Four structures do most of the work at B1, and each takes a week to make reliable.

• The conditional for hypotheses and politeness. “L’air serait plus propre.” “Je voudrais proposer.” Two correctly used conditional forms signal control immediately. Learn the six irregular stems, and you have the tense.
• Relative pronouns to join ideas. Qui, que, où, dont. “Une rue qui est fermée aux voitures” instead of two short sentences. This lifts both grammar and coherence at once.
• The passive for impersonal statements. “Une rue piétonne a été créée.” It appears constantly in French writing about public decisions, which is exactly the B1 topic pool.
• Negation beyond ne pas. Ne plus, ne jamais, ne rien, ne personne. “On ne peut plus circuler” reads far more naturally than “On ne peut pas circuler maintenant.”

Two more worth having ready. The subjunctive after il faut que appears often enough to be worth memorizing in one or two forms. And comparatives with plus, moins, and aussi handle any task that asks you to weigh options.

A word of caution. Attempting a structure and getting it wrong sits in the same band as not attempting it, per the descriptor. So practice these four until they are automatic rather than collecting a longer list you cannot control.

Test yourself with one rule. Write your 160 words, then underline every verb. If everything is in the present tense, you are capped in the middle band, no matter how good the content is.

Which Anomalies Can Destroy Your Score?

Four penalties exist. Off topic on content, off topic on text type, a blank page, or writing 79 words or fewer.

• Off topic on content. You cannot reach B1+ on task completion or vocabulary.
• Off topic on text type. You were asked for a letter and wrote an essay. You cannot reach B1 or B1+ on task completion or coherence.
• Both together. Task completion, coherence, and social appropriateness all go to zero.
• Under 80 words. Zero for the whole paper, whatever the quality.

The text-type trap is the one that surprises B1 candidates. Writing beautifully in the wrong format is not a small error. It blocks two criteria worth 10 marks. Read the situation line twice and ask one question: What kind of document is this?

The opinion material you build here transfers directly to the other papers. The B1 reading sample papers use articles on the same social themes, and if B2 is your next target, the B1-to-B2 timeline shows how long that step usually takes.

Which Topics Come Up at B1?

Everyday social questions rather than specialist ones. Transport, environment, technology, work, education, health, consumption, and local community issues cover most tasks.

Ten worth preparing:

1. Cars, cycling and public transport in cities
2. Recycling and reducing waste
3. Social media and screen time
4. Working from home
5. Studying or working abroad
6. Sport, health and daily habits
7. Online shopping and local shops
8. Volunteering and community projects
9. Tourism in your town or region
10. Mobile phones in schools

For each, prepare two arguments, one concrete example from your own life, and one solution. That last item matters at B1, because tasks frequently ask you to propose something rather than only give an opinion.

Personal examples beat invented statistics every time. A corrector reads a made-up percentage and thinks nothing. They read about your commute and see a real B1 user of French.

Candidates working through DELF B1 writing coaching build this bank over six weeks, which usually removes the blank-page panic entirely.

How Should You Spend the 45 Minutes?

Five minutes planning, thirty writing, ten checking. The final ten minutes recover more marks than an extra paragraph would earn.

A workable routine:

1. Two minutes. Read the situation. Identify the text type, the addressee, and the register. Underline every instruction.
2. Three minutes. Plan four paragraphs in the margin. One line each.
3. Thirty minutes. Write. Leave a blank line between paragraphs as you go.
4. Ten minutes. Count words. Check verb endings and agreements. Check that every instruction is answered. Check that the greeting and sign-off exist.

During the check, hunt for three specific things: subject-verb agreement, past participle agreement, and adjective agreement. Those three account for most avoidable grammar losses at B1.

Preparing the other papers in the same session? B1 listening sample papers explain the pacing of the collective session, which affects how fresh you are by the time you reach writing.

Does DELF B1 Writing Have Value Beyond the Exam?

B1 is now the level required for a French long-term residence card, raised from A2 on 1 January 2026. The writing skills also cover most professional correspondence in French.

The change came from Law 2024-42 of 26 January 2024, applied by Decree 2025-648 of 15 July 2025. Naturalization moved to B2 across all four skills simultaneously.

For learners in India, B1 writing is the level where French becomes genuinely useful at work. Structured emails, opinions in a meeting summary, a complaint, or a proposal. That is real workplace output, not exam performance.

For Canada, note the usual distinction. Immigration points come from TEF Canada or TCF Canada, not DELF, and those results expire after two years. DELF diplomas never do.

B1 is also the level at which French starts to change the jobs you can apply for. Career paths with French covers the sectors that hire at this level.

DELF B1 Production Écrite Questions and Answers

Get Your B1 Scripts Banded Before the Exam

You can self-assess vocabulary and grammar. You cannot self-assess your register, layout, or whether your argument reads as B1 or B1+. That needs a corrector.

Our DELF training program returns every written task graded on all five criteria, with a specific rewrite target rather than a general comment. Batches stay at six to ten students at the Noida center. Outside Delhi NCR, our online French coaching runs the same correction cycle.

Preparing the whole level? Pair this with the B1 oral mock paper, since the opinion structures overlap almost completely.

Call or WhatsApp 7011164582 to book a free demo and a marked diagnostic script.