The free versus paid argument usually happens in the wrong place. Students compare feature lists when they should be comparing targets: a daily task app is only worth anything, free or paid, if its tasks are aimed at the score you actually have to reach. And the score requirements by university have a wrinkle that most app marketing skips. The headline overall band is not the only number in the requirement, and often it is not the number that rejects people.
The floor under the headline score
In our harvest of 1,042 program records from this site's database, 540 carry a per-band rule: a minimum for every section, not just the overall score. Of those, 538 state a numeric floor for the lowest band. That floor sits at 6.0 in 199 records and at 5.5 in 195, so almost three quarters of per-band programs set their lowest acceptable section score at 5.5 or 6. Another 47 records set uneven floors, a higher bar in one section than the others, which is exactly the kind of detail a generic task list will never warn you about.
This is the number your daily tasks should be aimed at. An overall 6.5 built on a 5.0 in writing fails a per-band program, and it fails silently, because the app that trained you was watching the average.
Finding your own floor takes five minutes. Open the requirements page of each program on your list and look past the headline band for the words "no band below", "each component", or a small table of section scores. If none of that appears, the overall number is the whole requirement and you can train the average in peace. If it does appear, write the lowest section number next to the program's name. That handwritten number, not the overall, is the one your next month of daily tasks has to move, and it is the one almost nobody trains for deliberately.
When free is enough
- You need question banks. Plenty are free and fine, and a question bank does not get better because it sits behind a paywall.
- You are self-disciplined enough to build your own schedule, and honest enough to aim it at your weakest band rather than your favourite one.
When the $9.99 earns it
- You want a real 8-week plan instead of a folder of PDFs.
- You need scored mocks, not just answer keys, because only a scored mock tells you which band is dragging.
- Streaks and reminders are what keep you studying.
Free apps give you material; paid apps give you a system. One retake costs $200+ and a month. A $9.99 mock that catches your weak band before test day is the cheapest money in prep.
What a week aimed at the floor looks like
Concretely, aiming at the floor changes how a week of tasks is built. Instead of one overall-score mock and a victory lap, the week rotates by section: a timed writing set marked against band descriptors, a speaking session recorded and replayed for the errors you actually make, and reading and listening drills in shorter, more frequent bursts, because those two bands usually respond fastest to volume. The mock that matters is scored per section, and the number you write at the top of the page is the lowest section score, not the average.
It also changes what you should demand from an app, free or paid. Ask whether its plan knows your per-band floor at all. A plan that only tracks an overall target will happily schedule a week of reading practice for a student whose writing band is the one below the floor, because on average she looks fine. On average is how per-band rejections happen. Whether the app costs nothing or $9.99, that single question, does it plan against my lowest band, separates the useful tools from the decorated ones.
Aim the system at the floor
Whichever side of the paywall you land on, set the target correctly first: look up your programs, note the per-band floor as well as the overall, and train the lowest section like it is the whole test, because for 540 programs in this database, it is. The 8-Week Score Sprint Planner takes your current and target scores and builds the daily plan around the gap, which is the part neither a free question bank nor a folder of PDFs will do for you.