utanför

Utanför is a Swedish preposition and adverb meaning "outside" or "beyond." It describes a position on the exterior side of something or outside a defined area, and it can also be used in figurative expressions to indicate exclusion or something that lies outside a certain scope.

Typical uses are with noun phrases to indicate location: utanför huset (outside the house), utanför staden (outside the town), utanför dörren (outside the door). In spatial descriptions, utanför emphasizes being on the exterior side rather than moving away from the interior; for movement from inside to outside Swedish commonly uses ur, as in gå ur huset (go out of the house).

Figurative uses are common: det är utanför min erfarenhet (that is outside my experience), vi står utanför ramen (we are outside the frame). Utanför can thus describe both physical and abstract boundaries.

Grammatical notes: utanför is a preposition and does not inflect for gender or number. The following noun phrase follows normal Swedish definiteness, e.g., utanför huset, utanför ett hus. It is often found in fixed phrases such as utanför dörren, utanför ramarna, utanför Sverige. Related prepositions include utom (excluding, except) and ur (out of), which express different semantic relations.

Etymology: the word is formed from the prefix ut- meaning “out” combined with a base concept of boundary or area, and functions as a common spatial and figurative preposition in Swedish.