5 Prepositions

5.1 Prepositions of place

You can use the prepositions below to talk about where somebody or something is.

Preposition	Example
at	What time did you arrive at the station?
on	I left the letter on your desk this morning.
over	There was a lamp hanging over the table.
above	There was a sign above the entrance.
in, inside	OK, let’s see what’s in/inside that box.
outside	The red car parked outside our house is my brother’s.
under	The cat was hiding under the bed.
below	Mr Gower’s office is directly below mine.
near	We’d like to sit near the window, please.
next to	The little girl sitting next to Jane is her daughter.
beside	Who’s that standing beside Keith?
by	She’s just bought a beautiful house by the river.
in front of	The bus stops right in front of my school.
behind	She turned around to look at Eve, who was standing behind her.
opposite	There’s a supermarket opposite our house.
among	The teacher was standing among a crowd of children.
between	Ella sat down between Jo and Kevin.

5.2 Prepositions of movement

You can use the following prepositions to talk about the direction in which somebody or something is moving.

Preposition	Example
up	Come on, let’s walk up that hill.
down	Anna ran down the stairs.
onto	The musicians walked onto the stage.
into	He got into his car and drove away.
out of	I got out of bed and ran downstairs.
from	What time did you get home from work?
to	Could you drive me to the airport tomorrow?
towards	She stood up and walked towards me.
over	The dog jumped over the fence.
round	The earth moves round the sun.
along	They went for a walk along the river.
across	He swam across the river.
off	She fell off her bike and hurt her knee.
past	Tim walked right past me and didn’t even say hello.
through	You’ll have to drive through the tunnel to get there.

5.3 Prepositions of time

You can use the following prepositions to talk about when something happens or to refer to the length of time that something lasts.

Preposition	Use/Meaning	Examples
at	with clock times and points or periods of time	at nine o’clock, at midnight, at the beginning/end, at the weekend, at night
in	with parts of the day, months, years, seasons, centuries	in the morning, in July, in 2014, in the winter, in the last century
on	with days or dates	on Monday, on my birthday, on 5 January, on Christmas Day
by	to mean ‘no later than’	We’ll need the report by the end of the week.
before	to mean ‘earlier than something’	I always have a shower before breakfast.
after	to mean ‘later than something’	Let’s meet here after the show.
since	to mean ‘from a time in the past until a later time or until now’	I’ve known Kat since 2010.
for	to show how long an action continues for	We’ve been waiting here for three hours!
during	to mean ‘all through a period of time’, or ‘at some point in a period of time’	I worked in a hotel during the summer.  Her husband died during the war.
until/till	to mean ‘up to’ (the time mentioned)	Let’s wait here until she comes back.
past	to mean ‘later than a particular time’	It was past midnight when she phoned me.
through	to mean ‘later than a particular time’	She had to work through the night to finish her project.

5.4 Prepositions before particular words

Some prepositions are often used before particular words to form fixed expressions. There are a lot of preposition + noun combinations in English, and they are very common in both written and formal English. Here are some examples:

at	at first, at last, at least, at once, at present, at the moment, at times
by	by accident, by chance, by far, by heart, by mistake
for	for a while, for ages, for a change
from	from memory, from time to time, from bad to worse, from now on
in	in a hurry, in advance, in cash, in general, in other words, in time, in stock
on	on average, on business, on duty, on foot, on purpose, on the whole, on time
out of	out of breath, out of control, out of fashion, out of order, out of stock, out of the way
under	under control, under discussion, under pressure, under way

5.5 Prepositions after particular words

You have to use particular prepositions after some adjectives, verbs and nouns. For adjectives and nouns, see 1.6 and 3.4 above. Here are some examples of verb + preposition combinations: