What is the difference between look forward and looking forward

If you would like to learn more about the differences between formal and informal phrases used in emails, read Formal and Informal Email Phrases — from Greetings to Closing Phrases! Sign in. Log into your account. Forgot your password? Privacy Policy. Password recovery.

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Literacy and education 5. Legal writing 4. Style guide 4. Development of English 4. Wordplay 4. Pitches and proposals 3. Writing for media 3. PDF downloads 3. Partners 3. Social media 3. Tutorial 2. Editing 2. Examples: I look forward to meeting you tonight. He looks forward to graduating this year.

We dare not cancel the trip to Banff. The kids have been looking forward to this for ages! Both were looking forward to spending a wonderful evening together, but the weather cruelly disrupted their plans. I can't believe they 're actually looking forward to vacationing with us for three weeks. This house is super boring! Even though he knew it would be difficult and unpleasant, he still looked forward to having a heart-to-heart conversation with her.

Thus, it can only mean one thing: I am directing my gaze or view forward where forward is an adverb. Nevertheless, it is definitely acceptable to say: I'm looking forward to it! Jimi Oke Jimi Oke Granted 'I'm looking forward' can't be interpreted that way as it stands, but neither can 'I look forward' really. ElendilTheTall: Agreed.

I wasn't even going to deal with this shade of meaning, but I wanted to be thorough, as I wasn't absolutely certain of the OP's context. Look forward to something or look forward to doing something means "to excited and pleased about something that is going to happen" I'm really looking forward to our vacation. Manoochehr Manoochehr 9, 13 13 gold badges 47 47 silver badges 78 78 bronze badges. So if we consider "look forward to" to mean "anxiously await", then we can rewrite the phrase as: "I anxiously await your visit", vs "I am Anxiously awaiting your visit".

So in this case, "look" and "await" are the verb, and "forward" and "anxiously" are the adverbs. Erik Funkenbusch Erik Funkenbusch 4 4 bronze badges. I look forward to seeing you means I await eagerly to see you. I am looking forward means I am looking at the area in front of me.

I agree. Nonetheless, I do hear people say "I am looking forward to seeing you. I disagree. It could mean 'I am looking at the area in front of me', but you can't look 'toward' yourself. In the same sense as 'I look forward to seeing you', you could also say 'I am looking forward to going on vacation next week.

There is also nothing wrong with "I am looking forward to seeing you", just as there is nothing wrong with 'I am running towards the train station'. Bart Bart 3 3 bronze badges. N 2 2 gold badges 7 7 silver badges 12 12 bronze badges. Featured on Meta. Now live: A fully responsive profile.