All Together vs Altogether

All together vs altogether
Working all together is altogether more fun!
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Mixed up English

The terms all together and altogether can be confusing in English. Once you’ve read through this lesson, you’ll have an altogether better understanding of them.

All together

All together means everyone or everything together.

It’s time to sing. All together now!

The last time we were all together was in 2015.

Put the bills all together on the desk.

If the two terms can be separated, that’s a dead giveaway that the term you want is all together.

It’s time for all of us to sing together now!

The last time all of us were together was in 2015.

Put all the bills together on the desk.

Altogether

Altogether is an adverb and means "all in all," "all told," or "completely."

Altogether, not a bad day’s work.

It cost over a thousand dollars altogether.

It can add emphasis to an adjective, in place of something like "far" or "way":

That was altogether too difficult.

Working with you is altogether more fun!

The Bottom Line

If you can replace the term with something like "completely" or "when all is said and done," you are altogether better off with altogether. If you can rewrite the sentence to use all and together separately, the term you want is all together.

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Altogether vs all together

1 Response

  1. Graham 23 January 2015 / 00:29

    Altogether this was a brilliant explanation.
    I wish I could get you all together to let you know.

    Thank you

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