What is the word order in English grammar?

As a learner, you need to know that the sentence structure, which is the word order, is considerably rigid in English. This lack of flexibility occurs because the constituents of the sentence cannot be moved arbitrarily within it. So, they usually need to occupy their fixed place or position. In principle, the subsequent order of the constituents or parts applies in positive and negative English sentences:

Rule for English sentence formation

S-V-O

is the acronym (abbreviation) for

Subject (S)–Verb (V, main verb)–Object (O)

In most cases, this order may not be changed. Compare the examples:

Subject	Verb(s)	Object
I	drink	coffee.
You	don’t have	a car.
We	can play	the guitar.

In a more detailed breakdown, the English sentence structure looks as follows. Note that the place (details: locative adverbials) always comes before the time (details: temporal adverbials):

Subject	Verb(s)	Indirect object	Direct object	Place	Time
He	can give	her	the book	at home	tomorrow.
They	are going to write	him	a letter	at work	next week.

Alternatively, the adverbial of time may appear at the beginning of the sentence:

Time	Subject	Verb	Indirect object	Direct object	Place
Every day	Sue	does	–	exercises	at the gym.

Subordinate clauses can be extended by a preceding conjunction (connective words in English):

Conjunction	Subject	Verb(s)	Indirect object	Direct object	Place	Time
because	they	won’t be	–	–	there	later.
and	I	cannot tell	you	the secret	–	now.