The little word om is one of the hardest-working items in Norwegian, because it covers three jobs that English splits across three completely unrelated words. It is "about" when you talk or read on a topic (en bok *om Norge — "a book about Norway"). It is *"in" when you point into the future or describe a habitual time of day (om en time — "in an hour"; om morgenen — "in the morning"). And it is "whether/if" when it introduces an embedded yes/no question (*jeg vet ikke om han kommer* — "I don't know whether he's coming"). Three meanings, one form. This page keeps them apart so you can see which om you're reaching for.
The "whether/if" use overlaps with conjunction territory — for the deeper contrast between om and hvis in conditionals, see om vs hvis: Whether and If. For the full time system (i, på, om, ved, innen), see i vs på vs om: Time. Here we focus on giving om itself a clear three-way map.
om = "about" (topic)
The first and most everyday job: om introduces the topic of speaking, reading, writing, thinking, a film, a book. This is English "about/on/concerning." It is not for and not på — a point English speakers stumble on constantly.
Vi snakket om ferien hele kvelden.
We talked about the holiday all evening.
Har du lest artikkelen om klimaendringene?
Have you read the article about climate change?
Det er en film om andre verdenskrig.
It's a film about the Second World War.
Hva tenker du om det nye forslaget?
What do you think about the new proposal?
So snakke om ("talk about"), lese om ("read about"), handle om ("be about / deal with"), en bok om ("a book about"). When the English is "about [a topic]," reach for om first.
om = "in" (future point in time)
The second job is temporal and forward-looking: om X = "in X from now," pointing at a moment in the future. English uses "in" here too, but the trap is that Norwegian also has a different "in" for completion (på), so the two pull apart.
Bussen går om fem minutter.
The bus leaves in five minutes.
Vi ses om en uke.
See you in a week.
Jeg er ferdig om en halvtime.
I'll be done in half an hour.
The key contrast is om en time vs på en time. om en time = "an hour from now" (future point). på en time = "within an hour / in an hour's work" (completion of a task). Same English word "in," two Norwegian prepositions:
Jeg ringer deg om en time.
I'll call you in an hour. (an hour from now — future point)
Jeg ble ferdig på en time.
I finished in an hour. (it took one hour to complete)
om = habitual time of day, season, and "per"
Still in the time domain, om marks recurring/habitual periods — times of day and seasons that happen as a rule. English uses "in" or "during" or "at."
Jeg drikker te om morgenen og kaffe om ettermiddagen.
I drink tea in the morning(s) and coffee in the afternoon(s).
Det er mørkt nesten hele dagen om vinteren her oppe.
It's dark almost all day in winter up here.
Hun jobber om natta.
She works at night / nights.
This habitual om vinteren ("in winters, as a rule") contrasts with i vinter ("this (coming/past) winter, the specific one") — a distinction English blurs but Norwegian keeps. The same om also does frequency / "per" with om dagen / om uka / om året:
Du bør drikke to liter vann om dagen.
You should drink two litres of water a day / per day.
Vi trener tre ganger om uka.
We work out three times a week.
om = "around / round" (path)
A smaller but real spatial use: om can mean "around/round" along a path or route — going round a corner, a tour round town.
Butikken ligger rett om hjørnet.
The shop is just around the corner.
Vi tok en tur om byen før vi dro hjem.
We took a tour around town before heading home.
(This overlaps with rundt; rundt hjørnet is also heard. Om here is slightly more idiomatic/set.)
om = "whether / if" (embedded yes/no questions)
The third major job is grammatical, not prepositional in the usual sense: om subordinates an embedded yes/no question — English "whether" (or "if" in the indirect-question sense). After verbs of knowing, asking, wondering, doubting, the embedded question is introduced by om:
Jeg vet ikke om han kommer i kveld.
I don't know whether he's coming tonight.
Hun lurte på om det kom til å regne.
She wondered whether it was going to rain.
Kan du sjekke om butikken er åpen?
Can you check whether the shop is open?
Jeg er usikker på om jeg har tid.
I'm not sure whether I have time.
Two things to flag. First, the clause after om is an embedded clause, so it takes embedded word order — the verb does not invert as it would in a direct question, and any adverb like ikke comes before the verb (see Embedded Clause Word Order): ...om han ikke kommer ("whether he isn't coming"). Second, this om is "whether," used for indirect questions; for real-world conditionals ("if it rains, we'll stay home"), the default is hvis — and the om / hvis boundary is its own topic, covered in om vs hvis.
Spør henne om hun vil bli med.
Ask her whether she wants to come along. (indirect question — om)
Pulling the three apart
| om means… | Test | Example |
|---|---|---|
| "about" (topic) | talking/reading/thinking on a subject | en bok om Norge |
| "in" (future point) | "from now" | om en time |
| habitual / "per" | recurring time of day, season, "a day" | om morgenen, to ganger om dagen |
| "around/round" | path round something | om hjørnet |
| "whether/if" | introduces an embedded yes/no question | om han kommer |
Common Mistakes
The classic English-speaker errors: using for or på for "about," and mixing the future om with completion på.
❌ Vi snakket for problemet.
Incorrect — 'talk about' is snakke om, not snakke for.
✅ Vi snakket om problemet.
We talked about the problem.
❌ Det er en bok på Norge.
Incorrect — 'a book about' is en bok om, not en bok på.
✅ Det er en bok om Norge.
It's a book about Norway.
❌ Jeg ringer deg på en time.
Wrong sense — this implies you finished a call within an hour; for 'an hour from now' use om.
✅ Jeg ringer deg om en time.
I'll call you in an hour (from now).
❌ Jeg vet ikke om kommer han.
Incorrect — after om the clause is embedded, so no verb inversion.
✅ Jeg vet ikke om han kommer.
I don't know whether he's coming.
❌ Jeg drikker kaffe i morgenen hver dag.
Incorrect — habitual time of day is om morgenen (i morges = 'this past morning').
✅ Jeg drikker kaffe om morgenen hver dag.
I drink coffee in the morning every day.
Key takeaways
- om = "about" for topics: snakke om, lese om, en bok om — not for, not på.
- om = "in" for a future point: om en time = an hour from now (contrast på en time = completed within an hour).
- om = habitual/"per" time: om morgenen, om vinteren, to ganger om dagen — contrast specific i vinter.
- om = "whether" for embedded yes/no questions, with embedded word order (no inversion); conditionals usually take hvis.
- One Norwegian word, three English ideas — keep them sorted by the tests above.
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Start learning Norwegian→Related Topics
- om: Whether/If (Embedded Questions)B1 — om = 'whether' — the word that introduces an embedded yes/no question after verbs of knowing, asking and wondering, where English 'if' is ambiguous but Norwegian never allows hvis.
- i vs på vs om: TimeA2 — The full systematic range of time prepositions — i (duration, this-period, years), på (named days, completion-within), om (future, habitual times of day), plus ved and for…siden — with the duration-vs-completion trap.
- Embedded Clauses and the Verb-Late OrderB2 — The full subordinate-clause field model — subjunction + subject + sentence-adverb (ikke) before the finite verb — applied to embedded/indirect questions, where Norwegian keeps subject-before-verb order (jeg vet hvor han bor, NOT hvor bor han) and inserts som when the question word is the subject.
- for: For, Too, AgoB1 — for does several jobs: 'too / excessively' before an adjective (for stor, altfor dyrt), the time frame 'ago' (for tre dager siden), benefit and reason (takk for hjelpen, kjent for), the conjunction 'for/because', and fixed verb collocations (være redd for, sørge for) — with the recurring for-vs-til competition for 'for/to'.
- Time Adverbs: nå, da, snart, allerede, ennåA2 — The Norwegian temporal adverbs — nå/da (now/then), allerede vs. ennå (already vs. still/yet), fortsatt, snart, straks — and the tense pairings English speakers must relearn.