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There is a man inside a room on the 2nd floor. Is it idiomatic to say the following?

"Don't lean out of the window. You may fall out."

Now, there is a man standing outside a house at the window. His girlfriend is inside the house. Can we say

"He leaned into the window to kiss her."

because the opposite of "out of" is "into"?

Also, can we say

  • "We climbed out of the window to get out of the house." and
    "We climbed into the window to get into the house"?

or do we have to say

  • "We climbed through the window to get out of the house" and
    "We climbed through the window to get into the house"?
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  • He leaned through the window to kiss her. Generally speaking, you lean into some "containing space" (such as a room or car), but through an opening (a window or doorway).
    – FumbleFingers
    Commented Jul 4, 2020 at 13:21
  • @FumbleFingersReinstateMonica, but some people say "don't lean out of the window as you may fall"?
    – Tom
    Commented Jul 4, 2020 at 13:27

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Certainly you can speak of climbing out of a window.

I think it would be more idiomatic to say 'climb' or 'lean in through a window'. We speak of a bird flying into a window when it crashes into the glass because it doesn't understand about windows.

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  • If the window was already opened, to "lean into" or "lean through" would also be fine.
    – Mari-Lou A
    Commented Jul 4, 2020 at 13:55
  • English prepositions are tricky. So, we can say "he learned out of the window" but not "he leaned into the window" meaning "his head got through the window", can't we?
    – Tom
    Commented Jul 4, 2020 at 14:37
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    It's not wrong to say 'leaned into the window', but the consensus seems to be that 'in through' or 'in at the window' are more idiomatic.
    – Kate Bunting
    Commented Jul 4, 2020 at 15:05

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