I'm going to visit/I'm visiting my parents on Sunday.

[vitormarcias]

Hello, everyone!

I recently learned that when talking about future plans, it's okay to use either 'be going to' or the present continuous. For example:

'I'm going to visit my parents on Sunday.'
'I'm visiting my parents on Sunday.'

In other words, they seem to be interchangeable. My question is: Which one do you use more often in spoken English? Thanks!

 

[emsr2d2]

@vitormarcias Welcome to the forum. Note that I've changed your thread title - titles should be unique, relevant only to your thread, and include some/all of the words/phrases/sentences you're asking us to comment on.

It's hard to answer your question because it can depend on context and personal preference. If it were an answer to the general question "What are you doing on Sunday?" (in my experience, the present continuous of the main verb in the interrogative form is more common than "What are you going to do on Sunday?"), I would use the continuous in the answer as well.

 

[5jj]

From https://www.usingenglish.com/teachers/articles/ways-expressing-future-in-english.html

1. the present progressive (also known as the present continuous)
The present progressive can refer to a future situation that has been arranged before the present time. The arrangement continues through the present until the situation occurs:

Emma is seeing Luke tomorrow, (They arranged this meeting yesterday)

Note that only the context or co-text (in the last example the word tomorrow) can tell us which time-period a present progressive verb form refers to.

Also note that it is simply not possible to make arrangements for some future situations. It is therefore not normally possible to say XI t is raining tomorrow.X

2. BE + going to

Although you may hear or read that this form indicates ‘present intention’, this is not always true. It is hard to imagine any intention in this sentence: “Look at those black clouds; it is going to rain soon.”

BE + going to refers to a future situation for which there is present evidence. In the previous example, the present evidence is the black clouds. In the following example, the present evidence may simply be the speaker’s knowledge that Emma and Luke have arranged the meeting:

Emma is going to see Luke tomorrow.

When the present evidence is an arrangement, then there is, practically speaking, no real difference in meaning between the present progressive and BE + going to.

 

[jutfrank]

In other words, they seem to be interchangeable. My question is: Which one do you use more often in spoken English?

They are not interchangeable, though there may be certain situations where they could work equally satisfactorily. So instead of asking which people use more often, focus instead on learning the differences in use. It doesn't really have anything to do with what is more common, or with personal preference.

Here's the basic difference in use:

present continuous: for arrangements events, where time and place is instrumental
be going to: for intentions, where time and place is not instrumental