Alanna Madden
January 10, 2021
Grammar Tips
“Altogether” is an adverb meaning ‘completely’ or ‘wholly.’ The phrase “all together” means ‘everything or everyone at once’ or ‘at the same time.’
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It’s easy to see why “altogether” and “all together” are commonly confused words. Both expressions have similar pronunciations, spellings, and grammatical functions, and yet they have different meanings. Tricky words like these are called homophones, and they’re prevalent throughout the English Language.
The best way to avoid using the wrong word is to understand each term’s meaning thoroughly. To get started, you should know:
Another key difference is that “all together” is a phrase of “all,” which encompass other phrases like:
Notice the similarities? Phrases of “all” have different meanings because “all” can function as a predeterminer, determiner, pronoun, adverb, or noun. In the case of “all together,” “all” is a quantifying determiner because it references every person or thing in a group.
You might be thinking, “but how does this make the phrase different from the adverb?” The key difference is that “all together” implies how ‘everything or everyone’ occurred ‘at the same place’ or ‘all at once,’ while “altogether” only emphasizes the sum of ‘everything or everyone.’
According to the New Oxford American Dictionary, the word “altogether” is an adverb that means ‘completely,’ ‘totally,’ ‘everything or everyone,’ or ‘in total’ (“Altogether” 47). For example,
Additionally, we can use “altogether” to mean ‘taking everything into consideration, ”on the whole,’ ‘for the most part,’ or ‘in general.’ For example,
We use the noun “altogether” to mean ‘in the nude,’ but it’s generally found in the idiom ‘in the altogether.’ For example,
[1] Basically, by and large, chiefly, generally, largely, mainly, mostly, overall, predominantly, primarily, principally, substantially.
[2] All of, all the way, at length, completely, entirely, fully, in whole, thoroughly, through and through, totally, wholly.
[3] Across the board, all around, all in all, broadly, collectively, generally, inclusively, loosely, on the whole, overall, together.
[1] Barely, hardly, minimally, scarcely.
[2] Halfway, incompletely, partially, partly.
[3] Distinctly, literally, minutely, narrowly, restrictedly, singularly.
“Altogether” comes from Middle English al together as a combination of Old English eall (‘all’) and tōgædere (‘together’). The word tōgædere (‘together’) consists of the preposition “to” (a West Germanic word akin to ‘gather’) and means ‘with or near another,’ ‘in combination,’ ‘united,’ or ‘in agreement.’
The “all” that’s combined with “together” functions as an adverb to mean ‘completely,’ ‘consisting entirely of,’ or, as a noun, ‘the whole of one’s possessions, energy, interests’ (41).
“All together” is a phrase that consists of “all” as a determiner and “together” as an adverb to mean ‘everyone or everything together’ or ‘all at once.’ For example,
As a group, as one, in a mass.
To use these tricky terms in a sentence correctly, Garner’s Modern English Usage suggests using “altogether” to mean ‘completely’ or ‘wholly,’ and “all together” for ‘at one place’ or ‘at the same time’ (Garner 42).
No. One way to tell if a term is a contraction is to look for an apostrophe, such as in contractions like “can’t” (can not), “shouldn’t” (should not), or “let’s” (let us).
English grammar normally insists on using hyphens for prefixes like “all” before a noun. Since the “all” of “all right” is not a prefix, there’s no need for a hyphen.
To learn more about tricky types of nouns, adverbs, and more, check The Word Counter’s recent posts on:
Follow-up your grammar lesson with a review quiz on “altogether” vs. “all together.”
Answers
