Prepositions: "With" in Thai

To use the word "with" in Thai is not straight forward. Depending on its grammatical function, you need to use different Thai words.

Content

With in Thai

People being together

Lingo Ninja Research Team

1 min read · first published June 24, 2021 · last update June 27, 2021

With in Thai

In Thai there is no single word for "with", as the English word "with" can have different grammatical functions. These functions require the use of different words in Thai. Let's go through the functions of "with" one by one:

people being together - e.g. I went with him
instruments used - e.g. I fixed it with my hands
include something - the car comes with insurance

People being together

To talk about people being together, you use the word กับ

[person 1] [verb] กับ [person 2]

Examples

He walks with me
เขา

เดิน

กับ

ฉัน

Literally: he - walk - with - I

I speak to him. / I speak with him
ฉัน

พูด

กับ

เขา

Literally: I - speak - with - he

Instrument used

To indicate the instrument used, two patterns are used:

[subject] + [verb] + [object] + ด้วย + instrument
[subject] + ใช้ + instrument + [verb] + [object]

Examples

I washed my hands with soap
ฉัน

ล้าง มือ

ด้วย

สบู่

Literally: I - wash - hand - with - soap

I washed my hands with soap
ฉัน

ใช้ สบู่

ล้าง มือ

Literally: I - use - soap - wash - hand

Include something

To express that something includes something else, or that someone is holding or carrying something, or that things happen at the same time, we use พร้อมกับ :