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Can we use the word over ( I think as adjective) to mean that something, which can be refilled or re-bought, is finished or depleted.

For example:

1.This battery/power unit is over. We need to plug it in.

2.The cherry juice in the bottle is over.

3.The water in the tank is almost over. We need to refill it.

4.The gas in the car is over. We need to buy gas.

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  • Where did you get this definition? Also, sentence #2 doesn't make any sense. What are you trying to say with it?
    – Catija
    Commented Apr 10, 2016 at 16:39
  • @Catija it is not an official definition if you mean that. I am just asking if it is possible
    – Mrt
    Commented Apr 10, 2016 at 16:41
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    Over is about time. The show is over, the game is over. You can't use it about materials.
    – JavaLatte
    Commented Apr 10, 2016 at 17:34
  • The spot-on award goes to JavaLatte. Over also means "finished with" as in "She's over him now. She thinks he's an idiot. Isn't love strange?"
    – TimR
    Commented Apr 10, 2016 at 17:37
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    If you said "The water in the tank is almost over", I'd hear it the opposite way - that there's so much water it's almost overflowing. It's awkward either way, but the latter would be the more likely interpretation.
    – Darrel Hoffman
    Commented Apr 10, 2016 at 19:04

4 Answers 4

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We can't use the preposition over like this. We can use the preposition out in a different construction, to indicate that something we often replenish has finished. In this construction we we say:

  • X is out of Y.

In this construction, X is either the owner or the container:

  • We're almost out of cherry juice.
  • We're almost out of water.
  • The tank is out of water.
  • We're out of gas.
  • The car's out of gas.

We sometimes say that a battery is out, but the more usual expression is that the battery is dead.

  • The battery is out/dead.

If you want to use an adjective instead of a preposition, you could use the word empty. This doesn't always imply that the thing is refillable or reusable though:

  • The tin's empty.
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    @Mrt We normally use over when the thing has a set time, but not when it's just been used up. So the film's over or the holidays are over, but not the juice is over or the battery's over. In think in your example we're more likely to say the bottle's empty or That's it, the juice has gone. But we 're unlikely to say the bottle's out of juice, because we don't normally reuse bottle's like that. Also we normally use out of like that if the container's quite big and generally thought of as being refilled regularly.
    – Araucaria - Not here any more.
    Commented Apr 10, 2016 at 17:53
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"empty" is the word you would use here. "Over" is more used to define the end or finishing point of something based on time e.g:

  • The concert is almost over.
  • Our work is over.

So for quantity, use empty. For time, use over.

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The word you want in most of these cases is "empty". No, you can't use "over".

No one will understand what you mean if you do.

There are lots of definitions of "over" but none of them are the equivalent of "empty".

For batteries, we usually say that they're "dead" or (more formally) "depleted".

  1. This battery is dead; we need to plug it in.
  2. The cherry juice bottle is empty.
  3. The water in the tank is almost gone. We need to refill it.

For sentence 4, it's a really odd phrasing. The normal way of saying it would be something like.

The car is out of gas. We need to buy some.
The gas tank in the car is [on] empty. We need to get some gas soon.

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    Two things worth noting: (1) "Empty" is specifically for the container, which is why Catija rephrased "cherry juice in the bottle" to "cherry juice bottle". (2) The preferred word for batteries is (I think) a dialectal issue. For me (Australian English), "flat" is most common; "dead" is also acceptable, but more so for non-rechargeable batteries (plug it in if it's flat, replace it if it's dead).
    – Tim Pederick
    Commented Apr 11, 2016 at 16:06
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I believe that finished would fit.

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  • The entire issue with this question is that over is NOT a synonym for done, finished, or complete. In all the examples in the question, you could use "finished," but not "over."
    – Nick Matteo
    Commented Apr 11, 2016 at 14:12

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