Ending a Sentence With a Preposition: Myth vs Modern Usage

Someone has probably told you it's "wrong" to end a sentence with a preposition — a word like to, with, for, about, on. Good news: it's a myth. You can, and often you should. This is one of the most successful myths in the whole of English — successful at making people anxious, that is, not at describing how anyone actually writes. Once you can hear the difference between a natural ending and a forced "fix," you'll stop panicking and start choosing.

The myth

The old "rule" says never finish on a preposition:

"What are you waiting for?" → supposedly you must write "For what are you waiting?"

But that "corrected" version sounds stiff and strange — nobody talks like that. The natural sentence is the first one, and it's perfectly correct. In fact you do this constantly, without a flicker of doubt, until someone makes you self-conscious about it:

• Who are you talking to?
• What page is the worksheet on?
• That's the classmate I told you about.
• Is this the file we're working on?

Every one of those ends with a preposition. Every one is completely, unremarkably correct. Say the "fixed" versions aloud — To whom are you talking? — and you'll notice you've stopped sounding like a person and started sounding like a butler in a costume drama.

Where the myth came from

Hundreds of years ago, some very earnest writers admired Latin — a language where you genuinely can't strand a preposition — and decided English ought to behave the same way. But English isn't Latin. It's a Germanic language with a much freer word order, and it has always let its little relational words drift to the end of a clause. The "rule" was imported fashion, not homegrown grammar, and it never really fitted.

When to leave it, when to change it

• Change it only if the recast genuinely reads better — sometimes it does, in very formal or ceremonial writing. But never twist a sentence just to obey a myth.

Leave it when moving the preposition makes the sentence clunky:

This is the song I told you about. ✓ (natural) This is the song about which I told you. ✗ (stiff)

The test is your own ear. Read both versions in a normal voice. If moving the preposition makes you feel like you're putting on a strange accent, keep the natural, end-of-sentence version — for nearly all schoolwork and every friendly message. A formal rephrase is worth it only when the tone is genuinely serious and the rewrite stays clear.

The trap: phrasal verbs you can't split

There's one place where the "fix" doesn't just sound stiff — it breaks completely. Phrasal verbs. When a preposition is welded to a verb as a single unit of meaning — put up with, go on about, look after, run out of — you cannot prise it off without producing nonsense:

• ✗ That's something with which I can't put up. → ✓ That's something I can't put up with.
• ✗ …about what she's going on. → ✓ I don't know what she's going on about.
• We're running out of time. — there simply isn't a tidy way to move that one to the front.

When the rephrase wrecks the phrase, don't rearrange the furniture — rewrite the meaning. I can't put up with that becomes I won't accept that. Clean, formal, done. That's the grown-up move: a good rephrase is a real rewrite, never a preposition dragged to the front by the collar.

An edge case: the empty preposition

Sometimes a final preposition really is doing nothing, and you can cut it — not because ending on one is wrong, but because it's simply repeating work another word already did:

• ✗ Where is the meeting at? → ✓ Where is the meeting?

Where has already told us we're asking about a place, so at just hangs there uselessly. That's economy, not superstition. The skill is telling the difference: a meaningful end-preposition (the song I told you about) stays put, while an empty one (where is it at?) gets trimmed. Don't confuse the two and start hacking useful prepositions off the end of your sentences.

Why it matters

This myth survives for a slightly cheeky reason: it's easy to mark. A tired teacher or an old-fashioned editor can spot a preposition at the end of a sentence far faster than they can weigh your whole argument — so it lingered as a handy red-pen stroke long after experts had shrugged it off. Knowing it's a myth frees you to write the way people actually speak and read, which is nearly always clearer and warmer. And it saves you from producing those strangled of which and to whom sentences that make your writing sound nervous and borrowed. When you do meet a strict teacher or a stodgy style guide, you have grown-up options: rephrase cleanly, or comply just where it costs you nothing — but never contort your natural voice out of fear of a rule that was never real. There's even a famous joke about it: told off for ending on a preposition, one writer supposedly grumbled that it was "the sort of English up with which I will not put." It lands because it shows the rule eating itself.

Quick check

Which sounds natural?

1. Who did you go with? or With whom did you go?
2. That's the box I keep my things in.
3. Where's the party at?
4. That's not something I can put up with.
5. Formal essay: These are the values the school is built on.

Answers

1. Both are correct — "Who did you go with?" is natural for everyday writing; the second is very formal and a bit stiff.
2. Perfectly fine — ending on in is natural here.
3. Cut the at — Where's the party? The at is empty, so drop it.
4. Leave it — put up with is a phrasal verb; splitting it makes nonsense. If a very formal tone is needed, rewrite: That's not something I will accept.
5. Fine as it is — a natural end-preposition sits comfortably even in formal writing; there's no need to twist it to the values on which the school is built unless the tone is genuinely ceremonial.

Where next

• The Grammar Myths Clinic — the other "rules" that aren't real.
• What Is a Preposition? — the word class itself.
• Formal or Informal? Choosing How to Write — when to go more formal.