Lesson 092

Everything and all in Russian

Today we will learn how to say everything and all in Russian.

To express the idea of “everything, all, entire, the whole thing” in Russian, we use the adjectival pronoun весь.

The pronoun весь changes in gender and number as follows:

весьmasculine
всяfeminine
всёneuter
всеplural

Depending on the gender and number this pronoun can be translated as “all, everyone, everything, the whole of, the entire”. Let’s look at some examples:

Весь день шёл дождь, я вся промо́кла.
It rained all day, I got all wet. (masculine, feminine)

Я потра́тила на э́то всё утро.
I’ve spent the whole morning on this. (neuter)

Всё за́няло 5 мину́т.
Everything took 5 minutes. (neuter)

Все уже́ ушли́.
Everybody already left. (plural)

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As you can see, when the pronoun in any of its form is followed by a noun or/and another pronoun, it’s translated as “all, the whole”.

Все (plural) by itself is translated as “everybody, everyone”.

Всё (neuter) by itself is translated as “all, everything”.

Declension of the pronoun весь

All the examples above are in the Nominative case. Now, let’s look at the declension of the pronoun весь (not included in the audio).

case masculine feminine neuter plural
Nominative весь вся всё все
Genitive всего всей всего всех
Dative всему всей всему всем
Accusative (inanimate) весь всю всё все
Accusative (animate) всего всю всё всех
Instrumental всем всей, всею всем всеми
Prepositional всём всей всём всех

Now let’s practice the pronoun весь in different cases:

Вдоль всей доро́ги стоя́ли рекла́мные щиты́.
There were billboards along the whole road.
вдоль чего́? – вдоль всей доро́ги (Genitive, feminine)

Он рассказа́л всю пра́вду.
He told the whole truth.
рассказа́л что? – всю пра́вду (Accusative, feminine)

По всей стране́ лю́ди пра́зднуют побе́ду в чемпиона́те.
Across the whole country, people celebrate winning the championship.
где? (по чему́?) – по всей стране́ (Dative, feminine)

Мы поздра́вили всех ро́дственников с пра́здником.
We congratulated all the relatives on the holiday.
поздра́вили кого́? – всех ро́дственников (Genitive, plural)

Он досмотре́л весь фильм до конца́.
He watched the entire movie to the end.
досмотре́л что? – весь фильм (Accusative, masculine)

Она́ потра́тила все де́ньги.
She spent all the money.
потра́тила что? – все де́ньги (Accusative, plural)

Он всем дово́лен.
He is happy with everything.
дово́лен чем? – всем (Instrumental, neuter)

Мы обо́ всём договори́лись.
We agreed about everything.
договори́лись о чём? – обо всём (Prepositional, neuter)

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Good to know

Russians use the pronoun всё to finish a conversation or an action. For example:

Ну всё, мне пора́.
That’s it, I have to go.

Всё, пошли́ уже́!
Come on, let’s go already!

Всё, дава́й!
Alright, later! (this phrase is often used to say goodbye)

На э́том всё.
This is it.

And this is it for this lesson. We hope you enjoy learning Russian with our course. Come back for the future lessons!

Start the quiz
  • Question # 1
    Fill in the gaps
    У нас … получи́лось.
    We succeeded in everything.
    • всё
    • все
    • вся
    • весь
    Answered: 0 out of 10
    Correct answers: 0 (0%)
    Next
  • Question # 2
    Fill in the gaps
    Он не сказа́л … пра́вды.
    He did not say the whole truth.
    • всех
    • всей
    • всего
    • всем
    Answered: 0 out of 10
    Correct answers: 0 (0%)
    Next
  • Question # 3
    Fill in the gaps
    Во … го́роде не рабо́тает отопле́ние.
    The heating does not work in the whole city.
    • весь
    • всех
    • всей
    • всём
    Answered: 0 out of 10
    Correct answers: 0 (0%)
    Next
  • Question # 4
    Fill in the gaps
    Он переда́л вам … приве́т.
    He sent his hello to all of you.
    • всех
    • весь
    • всем
    • всей
    Answered: 0 out of 10
    Correct answers: 0 (0%)
    Next
  • Question # 5
    Fill in the gaps
    Мы жда́ли его́ … неде́лю.
    We were waiting for him the whole week.
    • вся
    • всю
    • всей
    • всё
    Answered: 0 out of 10
    Correct answers: 0 (0%)
    Next
  • Question # 6
    Fill in the gaps
    Он был … в по́ту.
    He was all sweaty.
    • всем
    • всё
    • весь
    • всего
    Answered: 0 out of 10
    Correct answers: 0 (0%)
    Next
  • Question # 7
    Fill in the gaps
    Ты … по́нял?
    Did you understand everything?
    • всю
    • всем
    • всего
    • всё
    Answered: 0 out of 10
    Correct answers: 0 (0%)
    Next
  • Question # 8
    Fill in the gaps
    Он … жизнь прожи́л в Петербу́рге.
    He lived all his life in Petersburg.
    • вся
    • всей
    • всю
    • все
    Answered: 0 out of 10
    Correct answers: 0 (0%)
    Next
  • Question # 9
    Fill in the gaps
    Он пригласи́л ... друзе́й.
    He invited all his friends.
    • все
    • всех
    • всем
    • всеми
    Answered: 0 out of 10
    Correct answers: 0 (0%)
    Next
  • Question # 10
    Fill in the gaps
    ... на́шу гру́ппу пригласи́ли на семина́р.
    Our whole group was invited to the seminar.
    • вся
    • всю
    • всей
    • всего
    Answered: 0 out of 10
    Correct answers: 0 (0%)
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2 comments on “092 – Everything and all in Russian”

  1. Jaime says:

    Hi! Maybe you don’t see this but I wish you do because I have always have doubts about this when learning russian. It is about the Genitive case sometimes being used where I think Accusative should be used. Here it happens with the sentence “он рассказал всю правду”, where I understand it needs Accusative because ‘всю правду’ is the object of ‘рассказать’ (рассказать что?). But in the test below, I came across the same sentence, only in negative and using “сказать”, and it is “он не сказал всей правды”. Why use the Genitive here?

    Thank you so much in advance for your answer and also for effort and hard work.

    1. Learn Russian Step by Step says:

      Hi Jaime,

      Thank you for your question and very sorry for not replying for so long, I totally missed the notification about your comment.

      When it comes to negation, most often, if not always, it goes with the Genitive case, even when in the positive statement it was the Accusative. It’s just the way it is.

      There are some cases when it’s ok to use any of the two (Accusative or Genitive) even without negation, especially in conversational speech. For example, with the verb купить when it’s followed by uncountable nouns: купить молока, купить хлеба, купить сметаны.

      Or another example:

      – Мама дала ему денег на карманные расходы.
      Mom gave him pocket money.

      Here we use Genitive instead of Accusative, and this is why:

      – The Accusative case is used if we mean that the whole subject was affected by the action (she gave him all her money).

      – The Genitive case implies that only a part of the subject was affected by the action. You can think of it as “она дала ему немного денег”.

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