Experience in or Experience on? Here’s the difference (+10 EXAMPLES)

It shouldn’t come as much of a surprise that the English language can be pretty confusing. There are so many rules and words that seem to contradict themselves. Actually, the rules aren’t too difficult; you just need to spend some time learning about them. When we look at experience in vs experience on, we’re faced with one of these “confusing” rules. Which one do we use in which situation?

Is It Experience In Or Experience On?

Experience in should be used when you’re talking about having experience in a field or subject. The experience in question is often referring to an intangible (not touchable) object. Experience on should be used when you’re talking about having experience with a particular piece of equipment. The experience refers to something tangible (can be touched).

Learn when to use Experience in or Experience with.

How Do You Use “Experience” In A Sentence?

So, what exactly does “experience” even mean, and how might you use it? Well, we use experience when we’re talking about how knowledgeable or well-versed we are at a particular thing or using something. The longer we’ve spent learning about how something works or how to do something, the more experience we have in that particular field.

Experience refers to a whole host of things. You can have experience in a particular subject at school or college. You can have experience in driving a particular vehicle. You can have experience in a particular sport or activity. The object you’ve got experience with doesn’t matter. The only thing that does matter is using “in” or “on” alongside the word.

As we’ve said, generally, “experience in” is reserved for things that can’t be touched, whereas “experience on” is for things that can be. You’ll have to get used to that if you’re planning on using the phrase for yourself in a sentence. Don’t worry; with a few practice runs, you’ll understand it.

Remember, though, saying something like “experience in games consoles” doesn’t make sense, but “experience on games consoles” does. This is because “games consoles” are a tangible thing that we’re talking about. It’s a piece of equipment to learn on. Similarly, we can’t say “experience on psychology,” but we can say “experience in psychology” for the opposite reasons.

Is It Have Experience In Or On?

When we use “experience in” or “experience on” in a sentence, we usually always have to introduce it with the word “have” or “has.” We can’t really do anything about it because experience isn’t a verb by itself. We need to include the verb “has” for it to make any sense. However, there is still no difference between using “have experience in” or “have experience on” from what we’ve mentioned above.

Either way, whether you’re using “have experience in” or just “experience in,” you’re still talking about a subject or an activity. And the same goes for “have experience on” or “experience on,” we’re still only talking about objects or pieces of equipment. Either way, the “have” has to be included if we’re talking about it in the past tense (which is how we’re often doing it). Since we’ve gathered the “experience” in the past, we use “have” in the past tense.

5 Examples Of How To Use “Experience In”

Now that we’ve sorted out all the rules and issues associated with it, we should look through some examples. Using examples is one of the best ways to learn more about language rules and how they look in an actual scenario. We use examples to explain things that sometimes words can’t do, so let’s look at how we might use “experience in” in a sentence before moving on to the next one.

  • I have experience in these matters.
  • We have no experience in geography.
  • She has no experience in this at all.
  • You have plenty of experience in this field.
  • What is relevant experience in this job?

As you can see, we can’t really use “experience in” without a verb coming before it. Whether it’s “has,” “have,” or “is,” we always need that verb to accompany it for the sentence to make any sense.

5 Examples Of How To Use “Experience On”

Now that we’ve seen how “experience in” works, we’ll find similarities with how we might use “experience on” in a sentence. Of course, the objects in question will be different, but the overall language rules still apply. Let’s look through some simple examples, and you can see if you can expand on them yourself or come up with your own ones.

  • I have experience on a PC.
  • We have experience on gaming consoles.
  • She has experience on driving tow trucks.
  • What experience on cars do you have?
  • Does he have experience on anything useful?

You can see from these sentences that “experience on” is used when talking about tangible objects. Of course, it’s a little outdated today to use “experience on” at all. We have transitioned it out for the most part and now value “experience with” over it. However, “experience with” is very well-equipped at replacing both “experience on” and “experience in,” so be careful not to get them confused if you use it!

Quiz: Have You Mastered The Experience In Or On Grammar?

Let’s finish up with a quick quiz to test our knowledge from this article. Hopefully, you’ve learned something about how we might use “experience on” and “experience in” in a sentence. You should get all these questions right, but don’t worry if you miss out on one or two! We’ll include the answers at the end anyway to help you, and you can go back and correct any that you might have got wrong! Good luck!

  1. I have (A. experience in / B. experience on) all things to do with computers.
  2. I have (A. experience in / B. experience on) the relevant subjects.
  3. She has (A. experience in / B. experience on) the field that’ll be useful to us.
  4. We have no (A. experience in / B. experience on) playing sports.
  5. My (A. experience in / B. experience on) these matters is lackluster.

Quiz Answers

  1. B
  2. A
  3. A
  4. B
  5. A