IELTS - How is the exam handed to students? My wife and I are taking the IELTS exam in a few days and this question just occurred to me - When taking the test, do students receive the whole listening/reading/writing package or do they receive individual sections as they finish the previous section?

I ask because during my practice sessions, I realized that I would usually finish the listening and reading sections a few minutes before the time limit. On the other hand, I always finish my essay in the writing section only one or two minutes before the time limit.
Therefore, by the end of the listening/reading sections I usually end up with a combined ~6-minute spare time. I would love to use that extra time to plan and actually write my essay, but that would not work if we can only do one section at a time.

So, how does the exam work? Do students receive all the sections to answer at their own pace Or do they receive individual sections, only receiving the next section after the previous one is finished?
The IELTS test format provides the necessary details. Each section of the exam is timed separately. Normally, all the materials of a previous section are collected before the next one is distributed.