In the top left-hand corner or at the top left-hand corner (2025)

Hello.

Which is correct: "In the top left-hand corner" or "At the top left-hand corner"?

Thanks.

Both may be correct. It depends on what is being said (the context).

Is it something written on a paper, located top-left?
Is it a bird perched on a rectangular building, located top-left?
Are you telling someone to hold a painting by the top-left corner of the frame?
Is it something inside of, outside of, or right on top of the "top-left corner" of something else?

You know "in" means "inside something", while "at" just means a location, a place. That difference will usually tell you which to use.

Hi, Dojibear. Thank you very much for your answer.

I'm describing what I see in a picture as they say at Cambridge English language exams. For example, "In this picture, in / at the top left-hand corner, I can see...".

At the top left of what? To the top left of what? Expressions like these say that A is in a certain place in/from B. If this is still the same example...

namename said:

"In this picture, in / at the top left-hand corner, I can see...".

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...then A is the thing you see, and B is the picture. A is at the top left in the picture. It is not "to" because it is not moving.

dojibear said:

At the top left of what? To the top left of what? Expressions like these say that A is in a certain place in/from B. If this is still the same example...
...then A is the thing you see, and B is the picture. A is at the top left in the picture. It is not "to" because it is not moving.

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But you do say "To the left, you can see X" or "Seated to the right is X" (and I've also read "At left, there's X")
Still, I'm sure there must be a more economical way of conveying the idea of "in the top left corner". In the context of, say, a museum guide describing a picture, I think I've heard "At the top-left, you can see xyz" and "In the upper left, you can see xyz"... Now which would you say are categorically wrong?

hamlet said:

But you do say "To the left, you can see X" or "Seated to the right is X" (and I've also read "At left, there's X")

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Of course you use different words, to say different things in different situations. Our example is "how to say that an object is in/at the top left corner of a picture". To say that, you would never say "seated to the right is X".

There are often several ways (several different sentences) to give someone the same information, without any of them being "wrong".

dojibear said:

Of course you use different words, to say different things in different situations. Our example is "how to say that an object is in/at the top left corner of a picture". To say that, you would never say "seated to the right is X".

There are often several ways (several different sentences) to give someone the same information, without any of them being "wrong".

Click to expand...

I don't think there's such a big difference between pointing at a person or an object in a picture. Isn't it essentially the same thing, grammatically speaking? If I were to describe a picture, which of these statements would be wrong?
"To the left, there's Mr. X"
"On the right is Mr. Z"
"Mr. X, at left, is holding a glass"
"In/at the center is Mr. Y"
"In/to the far right, there's a Louis XV chair"
"At the top, you can see part of the ceiling"
"At/in the top left, there's a painting by Renoir"