What's the difference between 'hasn't done something for 3 years' and 'hasn't done something in 3 years'? For example,
He hasn't played the piano for 3 years.
He hasn't played the piano in 3 years.
Is there any difference between them?
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Sign up to join this communityThere's been a significant shift in (American more than British) usage in recent decades...
...but the choice of preposition doesn't affect the meaning. Obviously this kind of usage shift doesn't reflect some "new" meaning that people never needed to express years ago.
Note that at least some people will be (consciously or unconsciously) "attuned" to this language shift, and they may well thus tend to categorise the earlier style as more "literary, formal". Not because that categorisation ever was true - but if you usually read the older version in older texts, but hear and use the newer version in conversations today, that's how things tend to end up.