1. All everyone everybody everything
We do not normally use all to mean everyone/everybody:
- Everybody enjoyed the party. (not ‘All enjoyed…’)
- Ann knows everyone in her street. (not ‘…all in her street)
sometimes you can use all to mean everything, but it is usually better to say everything:
- He thinks he knows everything. (not ‘knows all’)
- It was an awful holiday. Everything went wrong. (not ‘all went wrong’)
But you can use all in the expression all about:
- They told us all about their holiday.
We also use all to mean the only thing(s):
- All I’ve eaten today is a sandwich.
2. We use a singular verb after every/everyone/everybody/everything:
- Every seat in the theatre was taken.
- Everybody looks tired today.
- Everything he said was true.
But we often use they/them/their after everyone/everybody:
- Has everyone got their tickets? (=his or her ticket)
- Everybody said they would come. (=he or she would come)
3. All and whole
We use whole mainly with singular nouns:
- Have you read the whole book? (=all the book, not just a part of it)
- He was very quiet. He didn’t say a word the whole evening.
- She has spent her whole life in India.
We say the/my/her etc. before whole. Compare:
the whole book/all the book her whole life/all her life
You can also say ‘a whole…’
- Jack ate a whole chocolate cake last night. (=a complete cake)
We do not normally use whole with uncountable nouns:
all the money (not ‘the whole money’)
4. Every/all/whole with time words
We use every to say how often something happens. So we say every day/every week/every Monday/every ten minutes, etc.
- We go out every Friday night.
- The buses run every ten minutes.
- Ann goes to see her mother every three weeks.
All day/the whole day = the complete day:
- We spent all day/the whole day on the beach.
- I’ve been trying to find you all morning/the whole morning.
Note that we say all day/all week, etc. (not ‘all the day/all the week’)
