Adverbs

Adverbs are a part of speech that modify verbs, verb phrases, adjectives, clauses, and other adverbs,
and often answer the question how?, where?, when?, to what extent?, or in what way?.

Types of adverbs
Adverbs can provide information about:

Place: We use adverbs of place to describe where something or someone is located.

outside, inside, there, here, upstairs, behind, near, far, elsewhere

The noise is coming from the flat upstairs.

When it started to rain, we went inside.
You cant find that book here so you must look elsewhere.

Direction: We use adverbs of direction and prepositional phrases to describe where something or
someone is moving to.

through, towards, past, across, back, down, into, along, onto, to, out of

To get to my house, walk past the library towards the fountain.

They ran out of the burning building.
The police wouldnt let us through.

Distance: We use adverbs of distance and sometimes prepositions at the end of a sentence to
describe how far someone or something is.

from, away, away from, to

We were 100 kilometers from Stockholm.

We are in Los Angeles and San Francisco is 600 kilometers away.
It is about 30 minutes to the train station.

Probability: We use adverbs of probability to describe the chances of something happening.

certainly, maybe, definitely, possibly, perhaps, probably

Maybe the weather will be nice, but you should take a jacket.
They are definitely coming to the dinner party.
I will probably travel to Thailand next winter.

Time: We use adverbs of time to show when, how long, or how often something happens.

usually, always, never, tomorrow, now, then, hourly, weekly, already, finally, soon, still, since

He has lived in Canada since 2009.

I will finish cleaning the garage tomorrow.
He usually goes to the fitness club after work.

Manner: We use adverbs of manner to describe how something happens. These adverbs are often
formed by adding -ly to an adjective.

gladly, badly, happily, quickly, beautifully, luckily, anxiously, gracefully, professionally

She gracefully bowed to the audience.

He approached the podium anxiously.
The girl happily ate her ice cream.

Adverbial Phrases
An adverbial phrase is a group of words that functions as an adverb. Adverbial phrases may or may
not have an adverb within the phrase, for example:

He walked to school as slowly as possible.

This adverbial phrase consists of the adverb slowly.

I am leaving work in an hour.

This adverbial phrase doesnt consist of an adverb but still functions as one.

Some other examples of Adverbial Phrases are:

You can borrow some flour from the woman who lives next door.
He visits his grandmother every month.
She started her new job a few weeks ago.
Please sign the contract as soon as possible.
I found my favorite shirt at the bottom of the pile of dirty laundry.
The most recent version of the essay is sitting on top of that stack of papers.
There was a very strong storm during the night.
She will be travelling from November 1st until December 15th .

Adverbs and adverbial phrases can come:

At the beginning of a clause:

Yesterday the girls played with their toys.
Last night we went to a concert.
After the object:
He ran the race as fast as possible.
She snuck in the house quietly.

In front of the verb:

She rarely goes out at night.
They carefully put the wine glasses away.
In the middle of the verb group:
She has already cooked dinner.
I have never seen her look so tired.