on the paper / in the paper (2025)

Hello,

Please I am not sure if I should say: The instrucions are on that paper, or in that paper. Which one is it? Thank you for your help. Luciana.

Lucana said:

Hello,

Please I am not sure if I should say: The instrucions are on that paper, or in that paper. Which one is it? Thank you for your help. Luciana.

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That's a harder question than you might think!

The instructions are written on the paper.
The instructions are contained in the content of what's written on the paper.

If you are describing a sheet of paper, I'd definitely say on that paper. If you're talking about a paper as a longer document (something that is common in English), you could say in that paper--that is, in the text that is contained in the pages of the paper [document].

Is this more confusing or did it help?

Lucana said:

It definitely helps and it makes me happy that I understood that and that is why I was confused. This is "instructions to follow that are written on a paper and a secret agent hands over to a new innocent man who is going to do a job". It is a funny comedy. I think Ill go with it's in the paper (meaning in the set of instructions). Wouldn't that sound correct? Luciana.

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'

If it's one sheet of paper, it's more natural to say "on this paper." Now that I have a fuller context, however, I'll change my suggestion to "the instructions are in this note." (A note would be a brief message, and here we'd be talking about the content of the written message, not the physical medium on which it appears.)

donbill said:

That's a harder question than you might think!

The instructions are written on the paper.
The instructions are contained in the content of what's written on the paper.

If you are describing a sheet of paper, I'd definitely say on that paper. If you're talking about a paper as a longer document (something that is common in English), you could say in that paper--that is, in the text that is contained in the pages of the paper [document].

Is this more confusing or did it help?

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Hi , i have a question:
This sentence: It says in/on the paper that they're getting married in the spring in a small church on the island of santorini in Greece.
I think it is IN THE PAPER .....It is correct? Because in this case the paper it is the newspaper, isn't it???

Thanks in advance for youranswer...

Ambar

jucomcas77 said:

Hi , i have a question:
This sentence: It says in/on the paper that they're getting married in the spring in a small church on the island of santorini in Greece.
I think it is IN THE PAPER .....It is correct? Because in this case the paper it is the newspaper, isn't it???

Thanks in advance for youranswer...

Ambar

Click to expand...

It's in the paper. In this case, paper means newspaper.

donbill said:

It's in the paper. In this case, paper means newspaper.

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Thank you very much for your explanations about my question. Now it's clear!!