Deadlines and schedules

Knowledge of the basics of English grammar will help you to communicate clearly and confidently. Here, we review some of the structures typically involved in talking about timeframes.

1. Setting specific deadlines

We use by to say that something will happen or will be completed either before a specific time or at that time at the latest. Use “by” to give a time limit for something to happen:

We need the design by Monday.

We often use by then to talk about a deadline we have already mentioned:

Friday is the launch. Everything has to be perfect by then.

We use until to say that something will continue up to a certain time, event or deadline. Use “until” to focus on the duration of the action before a specific deadline:

We only have until Monday afternoon to finish the design.

We can also use both by and until to talk about past deadlines and duration of time in the past: I finished the design by Monday afternoon as planned. I worked on the design until midnight last night.

If you use until in a negative sentence, it means “not before”: You shouldn’t start work on the project until the budget has been approved.

Informally, people will sometimes use till:

We can’t start till we get the green light.

NOTE: You cannot use “until” with numbers or quantities. If you want to talk about a period of time with a limit, for example a threeweek deadline, use up to:

We can spend up to three weeks on this section. But it has to be finished by the end of this month.

2. Talking about specific dates We use on to talk about a specific day, date or part of a particular day:

We’re meeting on Friday. The product launch is on 16 October.

3. Talking about periods of time We use during to talk about something that happens within a particular timeframe. Use this preposition to emphasize the duration of time, or of a phase in the project, but not the end date. “During” is followed by a noun phrase:

You can contact me during the launch party if necessary. We should plan three meetings during the evaluation phase.

The conjuction while has the same meaning but is followed by a clause:

We should plan three meetings while we are in the evaluation phase.

We can use over in the same context. However, we generally use “over” if we want to focus on an activity that lasts for a length of time, not on an event or a point in time. In these examples, “during” is also possible:

Matt will work in London over the next five weeks.

We have made fantastic progress over the past few days. The preposition for is used to say how long something happens. “For” focuses on the length of time. In the examples below, you cannot use “during” or “over”:

Julie will work closely with the client at their office for five weeks.

We can talk about the goals for a few minutes.