onto

UK /ˈɒn.tuː/ US /ˈɔn.tu/

prep 3adj 1

Definitions

prep

Arriving upon or on top of (speaking of a physical or metaphorical movement).

My cat just jumped onto the keyboard.

A new drug has just come onto the market.

Aware of.

The thought-police were onto my plans of world domination.

Being an onto function with a codomain of (see below).

The exponential function maps the set of real numbers onto the set of positive real numbers.

adj

Attaining each of the values in its codomain; having its image equal to its codomain.

Considered as a function on the real numbers, the exponential function is not onto, as it never takes on values less than or equal to zero.

Collocations

ADJ.

all, balance-sheets, dangerous, managed, moving

He managed to keep his balance as he stepped onto the moving train.

VERB + ONTO

blacks, came, climbing, come, don't, fell, force, function

The cat fell onto the soft cushions and started purring immediately.

ONTO + NOUN

companies, daddy, floor, grass, husband, keyboard, platform, porch

She spilled her coffee onto the keyboard and watched the screen go black.

PREP.

out

The cat jumped out onto the fence and walked along it carefully.

ADV.

almost

She almost fell onto the wet floor when she slipped.

Thesaurus

Synonyms

Antonyms

Idioms & Phrases

latch onto

To obtain, acquire or get and keep hold of something.

They latched onto the idea and gave it up only reluctantly.

hold onto

To manage to keep something.

Desperate to hold onto power, Pervez Musharraf has discarded Pakistan's constitutional framework and declared a state of emergency.

hold onto your hat

One should prepare for a surprise or shock.

Hold onto your hat—intersecting planes are planes that cross, or intersect.

Example Bank

My cat just jumped onto the keyboard.

Wiktionary

A new drug has just come onto the market.

Wiktionary

Private-equity nabobs bristle at being dubbed mere financiers. Piling debt onto companies’ balance-sheets is only a small part of what leveraged buy-outs are about, they insist. Improving the workings

Wiktionary

Considered as a function on the real numbers, the exponential function is not onto, as it never takes on values less than or equal to zero.

Wiktionary

Try as you might, but you cannot force a belief onto someone else, much less your own self.

Tatoeba · #2262

She shone her torch onto the floor before us.

Tatoeba · #22278

Usage Notes

i Register

In some senses, onto is marked as informal. Watch for register when choosing this word.

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