Welcome to the page about the adessive case, which answers the question millä! If you’re looking for an overview about missä, mistä and mihin, look here.

1. Use of the Adessive Case (Millä)

1.1. When something is ON something

The most basic use of the adessive is to express that a thing is on top of something. In English, we usually use the preposition “on” for this.

1.2. When something is NEAR something

When something is near something, you will often also use -lla. Say you’re meeting a friend, and you tell them you’ll meet inside the library, you would use kirjastossa. If you’re agreeing to meet just outside of the library, maybe near the front door or in the near vicinity of it, you would use kirjastolla. Often, you will use “at” in English.

This isn’t always as straight-forward as it seems, so take a look at this article for more details: Hyllyllä or hyllyssä? Pöydässä or pöydällä?

1.3. When talking about open places

By “open places” I mean places without a roof, usually outdoor places (think: a yard, bus stop, market square).

This is not a 100% clear rule, because it does come with exceptions. For example, a street is a place without a roof (kadulla), but a forest and a park do have some kind of “roof” formed by the trees inside it (metsässä, puistossa). On the other hand, some kiosks clearly HAVE a roof, but you still say kioskilla. This most probably has to do with the history of kiosks. Originally, the salesperson would be inside the kiosk, but the customers were always outside.

Because the rule is so full of holes, you might want to just learn these words by heart. There really aren’t that many of them. Read more about these words in sections 2.1 and 2.2 in this article.

1.4. Saying you have something (possession)

Finnish doesn’t have a separate verb for “to have”. Instead it uses a different sentence construction, centered around the verb “olla”, “to be”, and the adessive case (-lla). You can read more about that in our separate article.

1.5. Saying you travel by (mode of transportation)

The adessive case is also used with means of transportation. You can read more about traveling by bus here.

1.6. Saying you use a tool to do something

Any tool you use can get -lla added to it to express that you use it to perform an action. You can find more examples in this blog post.

1.7. With certain expressions of time

You can learn more about expressions of time elsewhere on my website.

1.8. In many phrases

We use the adessive case in many phrases. I currently have two articles on these:

• [olla + x:lla]: olla eläkkeellä, olla harhateillä, olla tarjolla
• [x:llani/x:llasi/x:llaan]: pahoillani, kyljelläni, suu ammollaan

2. The Formation of the Adessive Case

The adessive is one of the six location cases. Its ending -lla/llä (see: vowel harmony) gets added to the same form as most of the other locations cases (-ssa, -sta, -lta, -lle).

2.1. Words ending in a vowel (-a/-ä, -u/-y, -o/-ö): add -lla/-llä

This is also true for some words ending in -i, but they generally have a different rule. See below!

2.2. Words ending in -e: add an extra -e- before the -lla/-llä

Words ending in -e get a second -e- in any case except the partitive. Words ending in -e belong to wordtype B, which means their basic form will be weak (e.g. parveke, koe) and their -lla form strong (e.g. parvekkeella, kokeella).

2.3. Words ending in -i

I have a separate article all about the difference between old and new words ending in -i. You could check that out after you’ve looked at the examples on this page!

2.3.1. New words ending in -i: add -lla/-llä

New words are often loanwords. Usually they’re recognisable because they resemble words in other languages, like pankki for “bank”, or paperi for “paper”. Loanwords are easier than Finnish words because they don’t undergo as many changes when you add endings. You can find more examples of new words in sections 1.1. through 1.4. of this article.

2.3.2. Old words ending in -i: replace -i- with -e- and add -lla/-llä

Old words are very often nature words. After all, nature has been around for so long that Finns have had names for things in nature since the very beginning. The age of some words can be confusing, for example äiti (mother) is actually a new Finnish word, even though mothers have been around since the beginning of time! You can find out more about old words in section 2 on this page.

This section combines words belonging to the OVI-type and the PIENI-type into one because these types undergo the exact same change when inflected in the illative case.

2.3.3. Old words ending in -si: replace -si- with -de- and add -lla/-llä

More old words, but this time with -si at their end. This group has its own additional change. You can find other articles of this type of words in section 2.2 on this page.

I have a more extensive list of words that belong to this type here.

2.4. Words ending in a consonant

2.4.1. Words ending in -nen: replace the -nen with -se before the -lla/-llä

This is the same change that -nen words go through when being used in any case except the partitive.

2.4.2. Words ending in -as: replace -as with -aa- + -lla

Words ending in -as (or –äs, depending on vowel harmony rules) belong to wordtype B, so they will have the weak grade in their basic form (e.g. rakas, opas) and the strong grade in the adessive (e.g. rakkaalla, oppaalla). Read more about words ending in -as here.

2.4.3. Words ending in -is: two groups

For words ending in -is, we have two groups: words like kallis that get -ii- when inflected, and words like roskis that get -ikse- when inflected.

2.4.4. Words ending in -os/-ös: replace –os with –okse– and add –lla

Words ending in -os and –ös will respectively get -okse- and –ökse– when inflected.

2.4.5. Words ending in -us/-ys: two groups

Words ending in –us can belong to two groups: some get -ukse-, others get -ude- before the adessive’s -lla. This depends on whether the word is derived from an adjective (e.g. pimeä > pimeys) or not. Words which have been derived from an adjective get –ude-, while other words get –ukse-. You will want to check out this article to get the specifics.

2.4.6. Words ending in -ton: replace -ton with -ttoma- + -lla

Read more about words ending in -ton here.

2.4.7. Words ending in -in: replace -in with -ime- + -lla

Read more about words ending in -in here.

2.4.8. Words ending in -ut: two groups

Words that end in -ut/yt can belong to two wordtypes. The smallest group of the two contains words such as olut, kevyt and lyhyt. For these words, you will replace the final -t with an –e- before the addessive’s ending.

The much larger group is made up of NUT-participles such as väsynyt and tottunut. For these words, you will replace the -ut/yt with -ee- before the adessive’s case ending.

2.4.9. Words ending in -tar

Words ending in -tar are rare, but at least tytär (daughter) is a common word. In the millä-form, these words get -ttare- in place of the basic form’s -tar.

2.4.10. Non-Finnish words ending in a consonant

Loanwords and foreign names (e.g. Jonathan, Facebook) which end in a consonant will have an extra -i- added before the adessive’s -lla/llä.

You might also want to check out these two articles:

3. Consonant Gradation in the Adessive Case

I have a separate article on wordtype A.

I have a separate article on wordtype B.

Related posts:

The Allative Case (Mille) – Finnish Grammar The Inflection of Postpositions – Finnish Grammar Adverbs of Location: Täällä, Kaikkialla, Ylhäällä Finnish Comparative Forms – Vertailuasteet