Từ for Source and Starting Point | Vietnamese Grammar

Từ marks the source or starting boundary of a movement, path, period, or range. English often translates it as from or since, but Vietnamese organizes these meanings around one question: where or when does the relevant stretch begin? This page focuses on that beginning; the endpoint markers đến and tới are covered on the goals page.

Vietnamese relational words are often discussed together under the broad heading coverbs, but analyses differ for individual items. Đến, for example, still has a clear lexical-verb use meaning “arrive,” whereas modern source từ behaves chiefly like a preposition and cannot itself mean “leave.” The practical lesson is that Vietnamese relational phrases form a system of their own and do not always occupy the same position as English prepositional phrases.

The relational system at a glance

Do not memorize từ = from in isolation. First identify the semantic relation, then choose the Vietnamese marker.

Relation	Vietnamese frame	Example fragment
static location	ở + place	ở nhà — at home
source	từ + starting point	từ Hà Nội — from Hanoi
goal	đến/tới + endpoint	đến trường — to school
accompaniment	với + participant	với bạn — with a friend
means	bằng + means	bằng xe buýt — by bus
beneficiary	cho + person	cho em — for you/a younger person
cause	vì/do/bởi + cause	vì mưa — because of the rain
spatial relation	ở + location word + landmark	ở trên bàn — on the table

The table shows why one English preposition can never be the organizing principle. English with, for example, can express accompaniment (with Lan) or means (with a knife); Vietnamese normally distinguishes với Lan from bằng dao.

Từ marks the beginning of a path

With motion, từ + noun phrase identifies the place where the path begins. The moving event is expressed by the main verb; từ contributes the source relation.

Sáng mai tôi bay từ Hà Nội vào Đà Nẵng.

Tomorrow morning I'm flying from Hanoi to Da Nang.

Xe này chạy từ bến xe Miền Đông đến Vũng Tàu.

This bus runs from Mien Dong Bus Station to Vung Tau.

Mùi khói bay từ bếp ra tận phòng khách.

The smell of smoke drifted from the kitchen all the way into the living room.

The most neutral order is often subject + motion verb + từ + source + goal/direction. A source phrase can also be placed first as a topic or scene setter:

Từ đây, mình đi bộ đến ga mất khoảng mười phút.

From here, it takes us about ten minutes to walk to the station.

Initial từ đây tells the listener which starting point to use before the main claim arrives. In speech it is normally followed by a slight pause. After the subject, từ + source can be tightly integrated with a directional verb: Tôi từ công ty về means “I came back from work/the office.”

💡

Think of từ as drawing the left-hand boundary of a path. The main verb tells you what happens along that path; đến or tới, when present, draws its right-hand boundary.

Starting points in time and ranges

The same boundary logic extends naturally to time. Từ + time means that the relevant period begins there. Context and aspect words determine whether it continues now.

Quán mở cửa từ bảy giờ sáng.

The café is open from seven in the morning.

Tôi sống ở đây từ năm 2022.

I have lived here since 2022.

Từ mai, chúng ta họp lúc chín giờ.

Starting tomorrow, we'll meet at nine.

English requires since with a continuing perfect construction, but Vietnamese does not change the verb for tense. Tôi sống ở đây từ năm 2022 receives its continuing interpretation from the time phrase and the real-world context. You can add đến nay “up to now” when the endpoint matters: Từ năm 2022 đến nay, tôi vẫn sống ở đây.

Ranges use từ X đến/tới Y:

Thư viện mở cửa từ thứ Hai đến thứ Sáu.

The library is open from Monday to Friday.

Từ nhà tôi tới trường chỉ có ba cây số.

It's only three kilometers from my house to the school.

A source can contain a spatial location word

For a simple place, từ + place is enough: từ Hà Nội, từ nhà, từ trường. For a more precise source, Vietnamese places a spatial location word before the landmark: trên kệ “on the shelf,” trong túi “inside the bag,” dưới gầm bàn “under the table.” Từ then introduces that whole spatial phrase.

Chị lấy giúp em cái hộp từ trên kệ xuống nhé.

Could you take the box down from the shelf for me?

Con mèo chui từ dưới gầm giường ra.

The cat crawled out from under the bed.

Mọi người chạy từ trong nhà ra ngoài sân.

Everyone ran from inside the house out into the yard.

The structure is từ + trên/dưới/trong/ngoài/trước/sau + landmark. Dropping the location word loses precision: từ bàn means broadly “from the table,” while từ trên bàn explicitly means “from on top of the table.” Learn more about the static frame on the ở page.

Source từ is not a motion verb

Some Vietnamese coverbs also function freely as lexical verbs. Đến, for instance, can mean “arrive.” Modern từ is different: in the source meaning, it normally needs a following complement and does not itself mean “leave” or “depart.” Use rời, đi, đến, về, or another motion verb for the event.

Tàu rời ga lúc tám giờ.

The train leaves the station at eight.

Tàu đi từ Huế lúc tám giờ.

The train departs from Hue at eight.

Words such as từ chối “refuse” and từ chức “resign” contain Sino-Vietnamese syllables that happen to be written từ. They are lexical compounds, not source phrases. Do not infer that source từ can stand alone as a verb meaning “come from.”

Sources beyond physical movement

The notion of a starting point also covers information, sound, light, and other things understood as traveling from an origin. The predicate identifies what kind of transmission is involved; từ identifies its source.

Tôi nghe tin này từ chị Lan.

I heard this news from Lan.

Ánh sáng từ cửa sổ chiếu vào phòng.

Light from the window shines into the room.

In the first sentence, Lan is the source of the information, not a companion. Nghe tin này với chị Lan would mean that you and Lan heard the news together. This contrast shows why semantic roles matter more than English words: English from fits the information source, while Vietnamese still analyzes the relation as an origin.

Source phrases can also modify nouns, as in ánh sáng từ cửa sổ “light from the window” or chuyến bay từ Hà Nội “the flight from Hanoi.” Here từ + source sits inside the noun phrase rather than modifying the whole clause. Context usually makes the scope clear; when it could be ambiguous, place the source phrase directly after the noun or event it belongs to.

A short dialogue: changing the starting point

A: Cậu đi từ nhà đến trường bằng gì?

A: How do you get from home to school?

B: Tớ đi bằng xe buýt, nhưng sáng nay tớ xuất phát từ nhà bạn.

B: I go by bus, but this morning I left from my friend's house.

A: Thế thì cậu lên xe ở đâu?

A: Then where do you get on the bus?

B: Tớ lên ở trạm trước công viên.

B: I get on at the stop in front of the park.

Changing từ nhà to từ nhà bạn changes the starting point, not the vehicle, companion, or destination. Bằng xe buýt independently marks the means. This layering is typical Vietnamese: each relational phrase contributes one role.

Common Mistakes

1. Using the goal marker for a source.

❌ Tôi đi đến Hà Nội vào Đà Nẵng.

Incorrect for ‘I travel from Hanoi to Da Nang’ — đến marks a goal, not a source.

✅ Tôi đi từ Hà Nội vào Đà Nẵng.

I travel from Hanoi to Da Nang.

Từ repairs the sentence because Hanoi is where the path begins.

2. Omitting the spatial word in a complex source.

❌ Tôi lấy chìa khóa từ bàn.

Does not mean specifically ‘from under the table’; without dưới, bàn is only a broad source.

✅ Tôi lấy chìa khóa từ dưới bàn.

I took the key from under the table.

Dưới locates the key under the landmark; từ marks that under-location as the source. The shorter từ bàn is grammatical, but it does not encode the intended spatial relation.

3. Treating từ as a complete verb meaning ‘leave.’

❌ Xe từ Hà Nội lúc sáu giờ.

Incorrect in the intended meaning ‘The bus leaves Hanoi at six’; the event verb is missing.

✅ Xe rời Hà Nội lúc sáu giờ.

The bus leaves Hanoi at six.

You can also say Xe đi từ Hà Nội lúc sáu giờ. The lexical verb rời or đi supplies the movement; từ Hà Nội supplies the source.

4. Translating English ‘with’ mechanically as với.

❌ Tôi mở hộp với dao.

Unnatural for ‘I opened the box with a knife’ — với normally suggests association or accompaniment.

✅ Tôi mở hộp bằng dao.

I opened the box with a knife.

The knife is a means, so bằng is the natural relation marker.

Key Takeaways

Từ + source identifies where or when a path, period, or range begins.
The main verb expresses the event; source từ does not itself mean “depart.”
A precise spatial source can have từ + trên/dưới/trong/ngoài/trước/sau + landmark.
English prepositions do not map one-to-one onto Vietnamese coverbs; select the marker by semantic role.

Now practice Vietnamese

Reading grammar gets you part of the way. The exercises are where it sticks — free, no signup needed.

Start learning Vietnamese →