Other prepositions of place
Introduction
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The family is sitting on a bench in the garden.
Grandpa is on the left and mum and dad are at the back. Grandma is in the middle, between the children. The dog is on the right.
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Prepositions of place
These prepositions give us information about where something is located. The following tables give some guidelines and examples but you may hear some variations depending on sentence structure, context and regional variations.
Other prepositions of place
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| Uses | Examples |
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above
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Higher than
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Our plane is now above the clouds.
Let's put the shelf on this wall above the TV.
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Under
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Directly below |
The cat's under the table.
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Opposite
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On the other side of something |
I sat opposite James at the meeting.
The bank is opposite the station.
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Near
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A short distance from |
"Is the hotel near the station?" "Yes, it's just a 5-minute walk away."
We live near the sea. [up to a few km away] |
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next to
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Adjacent to, at the side of [closer than near]
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We live next to the sea. [a few metres away - we can see it]
I sit next to Jane at work. |
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behind
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At the back of |
The car park is behind the shopping centre.
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in front of
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Just ahead of or close to the front part of something |
The shopping centre is in front of the car park.
There's a statue in front of the fountain.
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around
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On every side or in a circular way
Just past a corner, after turning it
'Near', in this area |
They sat around a table.
There are lots of restaurants around the square.
Where's the station; is it far? No, it's around the next corner.
Is there a station around here?
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between
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Having something on each side |
The bank is between a supermarket and a book shop.
My desk is between Harry's and Marie's.
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From
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A point of origin |
He lives in London now but he's from the north of England.
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'Opposite' or 'in front of'?
These are often confused. Sometimes, we can distinguish between them simply by considering the following examples:
- There was a man in front of me on the bus. [I could see the back of his head.]
- There was a man opposite me at the meeting. [I could see his face.]
However, we use 'in front of' when talking about objects with 'screens':
- She spends too much time in front of the mirror/tv/computer.
This is because we usually use 'in front of' when there is little or no space between things and 'opposite' when there is a greater distance:
There's one street lamp in front of my house and another one opposite my house.
'In' and 'out'
As adverbs, these can be used alone to mean 'here' or 'not here':
- “Can I speak to Jack, please?”
- “Sorry, he's not in today. Can I take a message?” [not at work]
- I'm the only person at home today. Everyone else is out. [not at home]
- We're going out later, maybe to the cinema; we're not sure yet.
- I didn't hear you come in last night; what time was it?
See also Adverbs of time and place.