How To Use Adverbs Of Place In German – With Exercises 

Today, we're going to learn about 3 essential ways to talk about places in German. Words that help us do this are called "adverbs of place", and they can help us to ask questions and orient ourselves. 

Let’s imagine: You’ve just arrived in Germany after a long, exhausting trip. You’re getting hungry when you realize that your internet connection is gone and the only person that you meet on the street doesn’t speak a word of English. 

In a situation like that, you can just ask:

• Entschuldigen Sie bitte, wo kann ich etwas zu essen kaufen? (Excuse me, please, where can I buy something to eat?)

Wo finde ich etwas zu essen?

Where can I find something to eat?

And, of course, you’ll have to be able to understand the answer to this question. 

If they say:

• Hier gibt es keine Restaurants, versuchen Sie da drüben. (There aren’t any restaurants here, try over there.), 

...you’ll definitely need to know what hier and da drüben mean. 

See? It’ll be essen-tial for you in that situation ("essen" in German means “to eat”).

Diesen Burger gibt es nur hier.

(This burger is only available here.)

German Adverbs: A Quick Grammar Lesson

Before we dig in, we need to know the difference between these two pairs of terms:

• adverbs vs. adverbials
• adverbs of place vs. adverbs of direction. 

Adverbs Vs. Adverbials

Adverbs are cute little words that describe other words in a sentence: verbs, nouns, adjectives or even other adverbs. They provide valuable information about time, place, manner or reason.  

• Sitzt hier jemand? (Is someone sitting here?)
• Was machst du da? (What are you doing there?)

If an adverb is a single word, an adverbial is its ‘married’ sibling. These can be individual words, phrases or even whole sentences. 

• Da drüben ist ein Restaurant. (There is a restaurant over there.)
• Das Bild hängt an der Wand. (The picture hangs on the wall.)

Adverbs and adverbials have a lot in common because they do the same thing: they give us information about time, place, manner or reason. In this post we’ll be using the term "adverbial" often, because it's the most useful when we're talking about place.

Adverbs Of Place Vs. Adverbs Of Direction

Adverbs of place tell us about position and answer the question “where?” (wo?) like in the examples from the beginning of this post: 

• hier (here)
• da (there) 
• da drüben (over there)

Adverbs of direction provide information about direction and answer the question: “where from?” (woher?) or “where to?” (wohin?). Here are some examples:

• vorwärts / rückwärts (forward / backward)
• bergauf / bergab (down the hill / up the hill)
• her / hin (read more about “hin” and “her” here.)

Ok, enough with the introduction and “warming up” for the topic. Are you ready to party here (hier), there (da) and everywhere (überall)?

Let’s take a look at 3 different ways to express information about place in German. 

3 Ways To Express Information About Place In German

For Fresh Starters: 1 Word

The first scenario is the simplest one: using a single adverb.

Here is more or less a complete list of the adverbs of place:

• hier (here) / da (there) / dort (there) 
• oben (at the top of) / unten (at the bottom of) 
• vorn (up front) / hinten (at the back) 
• außen (on the outside) / innen (on the inside) 
• draußen (outside) / drinnen (inside) 
• mitten (in the middle of) 
• nebenan (next door) 
• links (on the left side) / rechts (on the right side)
• überall (everywhere) 
• irgendwo (somewhere) 
• anderswo (somewhere else)
• nirgendwo / nirgends (nowhere) 
• auswärts (not at home)

Ready to see adverbs of place in use? Here they come: 

hier (here)

hier is one of the first words that you’ll ever learn in German. It means “here”: 

• Ich wohne hier. (I live here.)
• Was ist hier los? (What’s happening here?)

Ich wohne hier. 

(I live here.)

dort (there)

dort is also one of the first words that you’ll learn in German. It refers to a place away from you:

• Sie arbeitet dort seit Juni. (She has been working there since June.)
• Ich bleibe dort bis Sonntag. (I’ll stay there until Sunday.)

da (there) 

“da” mostly has the same meaning as “dort”, but people tend to use it more often in everyday German. 

The first example can often be heard in horror movies:

• Ist jemand da? (Is somebody there?)
• Der Mann da fragt nach dir. (The man there asks about you.)

oben (at the top of)

Some interesting examples for oben would be: 

• “Harry Potter” steht ganz oben im Regal. (“Harry Potter” is at the very top of the shelf.)
• Ich höre Stimmen oben im zweiten Stock. (I can hear voices—up there—on the second floor.)

unten (at the bottom)

Some people love to keep all their stuff on shelves:

• Meine Schuhe stehen ganz unten (im Regal). (I keep my shoes—down there— at the bottom of the shelf.)

If you’re taking exams, you definitely don’t want to hear the following sentence:

• Sein Name stand ganz unten auf der Liste. (His name was at the bottom of the list.)

vorn (up front)

When you’re showing your old class photo to someone, you might want to explain who/where you are in it:

• Ich stehe vorn links. (I'm standing at the front left.)
• Wer ist das vorn rechts? (Who’s that at the front right?)

Please make sure that you never have to say the following sentence when it comes to getting a slice of cake: 

• Ich stehe immer hinten in der Reihe. (I'm always standing at the back of the line.)

Or that you have to ask somebody to leave, for any given reason:

• Der Ausgang ist hinten. (The exit is in the back.)

außen (on the outside) / innen (on the inside)

außen and innen refer to the outer or inner surface of something. For example:

• Die Glastür ist außen schmutzig. (The glass door is dirty on the outside.)
• Der Becher ist außen und innen vergoldet. (The cup is gold-plated on the outside and inside.)

draußen (outside) / drinnen (inside)

These two words sound similar to “außen” and “innen”, but they refer to being physically away from an object or contained within it. 

• Kinder spielen draußen. (Children are playing outside.)
• Warten Sie bitte draußen. (Please wait outside.)
• Ich möchte lieber drinnen bleiben. (I’d rather stay inside.)

mitten (in the middle of)

Here are some examples:

• Mitten im Garten steht ein Tisch. (There is a table in the middle of the garden.)
• Er lebt mitten in London. (He lives in the middle of London.)

nebenan (next door)

This word is really fascinating because it describes “a person or an object that lives or is placed right next to my home”. It tells a whole story! 

• Er wohnt nebenan. (He lives next door.)
• Die Wohnung nebenan ist leer. (The apartment next door is empty.)
• Der Park liegt direkt nebenan. (The park is right next to it.)

Alice wohnt nebenan.

(Alices lives next door.)

links (on the left) / rechts (on the right)
Here are some examples:  

• Die dritte Tür links/ rechts. (The third door on the left/right.)

The following example is a phrase with the meaning “he is totally confused”:

• Er weiß nicht mehr, was rechts und was links ist. (He doesn't know what right and left is anymore.)

irgendwo, überall, anderswo and nirgendwo are indefinite place adverbs.
These adverbs can be very helpful if you’ve lost something and are trying to find it, just take a look at these examples: 

irgendwo (somewhere)

• Meine Tasche ist weg! Sie muss irgendwo hier sein. (My bag is gone! It must be here somewhere.)
• Hast du sie schon irgendwo gesehen? (Have you seen it somewhere?)

überall (everywhere) 

• Ich habe sie überall gesucht. (I was looking for it everywhere.)

anderswo (somewhere else, elsewhere)

• Sie ist nicht hier. Versuch’s anderswo. (It’s not here. Try somewhere else.)

nirgendwo / nirgends (nowhere, not...anywhere)

• Ich kann sie nirgendwo finden. (I can’t find it anywhere.)

Ich kann es nirgendwo finden.

(I can’t find it anywhere.)

auswärts (not at home)

We can use this word in German if we speak about eating out or about sports:

• Ich esse gern auswärts. (I like to eat out.)
• Ich esse relativ viel auswärts. (I eat out relatively often.)
• Das Team musste viel auswärts spielen. (The team had to play a lot of away games [lit. ...play away a lot.]) 

For More Advanced Learners: 2 Or More Words

We can also use 2 or more words to give us more specific information about place.

Earlier, I mentioned that adverbs of place often pair up with other bits of information about place to give us more detail:

• mitten im Garten (mitten + im Garten: in the middle of the garden)
• oben im zweiten Stock (oben + im zweiten Stock: upstairs on the second floor)
• unten im Regal (unten + im Regal: at the bottom of the shelf)
• irgendwo hier (irgendwo + hier: somewhere here)
• hinten in der Reihe (hinten + in der Reihe: at the back of the line)
• vorn links (vorn + links: at the front left). 

There are many other examples as well, like the one from the beginning of this blog post: 

da drüben (over there)

• Wo kann ich essen? - Versuchen Sie es da drüben. (Where can I eat? - You can try over there.)
• Siehst du das Haus da drüben? Dort ist Mozart geboren. (Do you see the house over there? Mozart was born there.)

Many word groups with prepositions also belong to this category 
(prepositional phrases: preposition + noun).

Let’s list some of them:

zu Hause (at home)

• Wo bist du? - Ich bin zu Hause.

(Where are you? - I’m at home.)

auf dem Land(e) (in the countryside)

• Wo wohnen deine Eltern? - Sie wohnen auf dem Land. (Where do your parents live? - They live in the countryside.)
• Ich verbringe viel Zeit auf dem Lande. (I spend  a lot of time in the country.)

in der Nähe (von) (near)

• Ich wohne in der Nähe von der Bushaltestelle. (I live near the bus stop.)
• Gibt es eine Buchhandlung hier in der Nähe? (Is there a bookstore somewhere here—nearby?)

There are also many, many other examples of prepositional phrases that provide information about place, just to list some of them:

• am Markt (at the market)
• an der Wand (on the wall) 
• auf dem Spielplatz (on the playground)
• auf dem Hof (in the yard)
• an der Uni (at the university)
• im Seminar (at the seminar)
• auf der Party (at the party)

For Experts: Entire Clauses

Finally, information about place can be expressed with a whole clause in German. In this case, a verb comes into play. Let’s take a look: 

• Er wohnt dort, wo seine Eltern wohnen. (He lives [there] where his parents live.)
• Da, wo du bist, ist mein Zuhause. (My home is [there] where you are.)
• Wo normalerweise das Bett steht, hat jetzt ein Schreibtisch seinen Platz. (Where the bed normally stands, a desk now has its place.)

These sentences also answer the question wo? (where?), just like any other information about place.

How To Use German Adverbials Of Place In A Sentence

When it comes to building sentences with adverbials of place, the most important thing is to treat the information about place as one whole or one unit. It doesn’t matter if it is 1, 2, or 3 words, or a whole sentence, they build one whole and take their place in a sentence as a single unit. 

If you keep this in mind, you'll be able to comfortably build sentences with any kind of place information— as long as you keep all other rules for word order in mind. 😉

Exercises: Adverbs Of Place