Learn English – What are differences between “during” and “while”

word-differenceword-meaningword-usage

They arrived while we were having dinner.

Can I use "during" instead of "while" in that sentence? How about this sentence:

Would you look after the children while I do the shopping?

Best Answer

The meanings are similar but I'm finding it hard to think of an instance where you could simply exchange the two words without restructuring the sentence.

They arrived while we were having dinner

could be expresses as:

They arrived during our dinner

and:

Would you look after the children while I do the shopping?

would become:

Would you look after the children during my shopping trip?

After analyzing your two examples, it seems like during precedes a noun, but while precedes a verbal phrase. This makes sense, because during is a preposition, but – when used to mean "during the time that" – while is a conjunction.

Here are some more examples where I try to exchange the two words:

He sprained his ankle during the game.
He sprained his ankle while playing the game.

I can't concentrate on my homework during the television show.
I can't concentrate on my homework while the TV show is on.

I started to get scared during the thunderstorm.
I started to get scared while the thunderstorm was raging.

The word while is more likely to be interchangeable with the word as:

I started to get scared as the thunderstorm was raging.

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