Parts of Speech Intermediate

Prepositions

Master English prepositions of time, place and direction. Learn the key rules for "in", "on", "at", common prepositional collocations, and the most frequent preposition errors in PTE and IELTS.

What is Prepositions?

Prepositions are short words that express relationships between nouns, pronouns and other elements in a sentence. While their individual meanings are often learnable by rule, many prepositions are collocational — they depend on the word they attach to rather than logical rules. Preposition errors are among the most common in IELTS Writing and PTE Grammar tasks.

Rules & Formation

Time — in: months, years, decades, centuries, seasons. "In March", "in 2020", "in the morning".
Time — on: days, dates, specific days + part of day. "On Monday", "on 15 July", "on Monday morning".
Time — at: specific times, holidays. "At 8:30am", "at night", "at Christmas".
Place — in: enclosed spaces, cities, countries, large areas. "In the room", "in Sydney", "in Australia".
Place — on: surfaces, public transport, floors, streets. "On the table", "on the train", "on the first floor".
Place — at: specific points, addresses, events. "At the station", "at 45 Oxford Street", "at the conference".

Examples

The study was conducted in 2020, in Sydney, at a major research university.

The meeting is on Monday at 9am at the conference centre.

There has been an increase in the number of applicants.

The results are consistent with previous research.

She specialises in academic English. (not: specialises for/of)

The report focuses on three key areas. (not: focuses in/for)

🎯 Exam Tip — PTE & IELTS

Prepositional collocations are heavily tested in PTE Write from Dictation and affect IELTS Writing Lexical Resource scores. The most common academic prepositional collocations: "an increase in", "a decrease in", "a rise in", "a fall in", "an impact on", "an effect on", "consistent with", "in contrast to", "compared with/to", "in terms of", "with regard to", "as a result of". Memorise these as fixed phrases.

Frequently Asked Questions

How do I know which preposition follows a particular verb or noun?

Most prepositions after verbs and nouns must be memorised as collocations. Common verb + preposition: depend on, focus on, consist of, result in, contribute to, lead to, deal with, respond to, apply for, look for, belong to, agree with, differ from. Common noun + preposition: increase in, impact on, solution to, cause of, demand for, attitude towards, relationship between. Reading academic English texts regularly is the most effective way to internalise these.

What prepositions are used in IELTS Writing Task 1 for describing graphs?

Key prepositions for graph description: "a rise/increase in [the figure]"; "from [value] to [value]"; "by [amount]" for change: "increased by 20%"; "to [value]" for reaching a level: "rose to 45,000"; "in [year]"; "between [year] and [year]"; "compared with/to [previous period]"; "as a proportion of [total]". Correct preposition use in these fixed phrases is essential for a 7+ band in Task 1.

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