[Vocabulary] You have to hand in the work latest by 5 p.m.

[gurpreetgill4u]

Hello,

I am confused about the usage of "latest" as an adverb.
'You have to hand in the work latest by 5 p.m' or 'you have to hand in the work by 5 p.m latest'.
Which one do you think is correct?
Could you also help me with the sentence structure in the second sentence.I am not sure whether 'latest' is an adverb or not. If it is an adverb,could you explain what it is modifying.

I am grateful for your help

 

[emsr2d2]

Hello,

I am confused about the usage of "latest" as an adverb.
'You have to hand in the work latest by 5 p.m' or 'you have to hand in the work by 5 p.m latest'.
Which one do you think is correct?
Could you also help me with the sentence structure in the second sentence. (Space required after a full stop.) I am not sure whether 'latest' is an adverb or not. If it is an adverb, (space required after a comma) could you explain what it is modifying?

I am grateful for your help.

Note my amendments above, marked in red. You must put a space after every comma, full stop, question mark and exclamation mark.

I find both versions of your sentence unnatural, particularly the first. I would say "You have to hand in the work by 5pm at the latest".

 

[gurpreetgill4u]

Could you take a look at the below mentioned website?

http://the-difference-between.com/latest/recent

I would really appreciate if you could examine 'the latest' section for adverb and the way he used "latest" without 'at the'.

 

[bhaisahab]

The site you linked to is American. Perhaps they use "latest" like that in AmE. We don't use it without "at the" in BrE.

 

[gurpreetgill4u]

I would rather use what you have suggested.
Could you also tell me how to answer a question that begins with "what is the latest/soonest/earliest you could do xyz"?
Do I need to put 'at the' before such questions?

Example:
Q1: What is the latest/earliest you could cancel a reservation?
A1: 0300 is the latest/earliest you could cancel a reservation.
A2: You could cancel a reservation by 0300 at the earliest/latest.

Thanks for your consideration.

 

[GoesStation]

Your examples are all correct. You used at the latest correctly in A2. It wouldn't work in the other two sentences.