More Advanced Ways To Say ‘I Think’ In English

Learn more advanced ways to say ‘I think’ in English. Learn new words to improve your vocabulary to help you communicate well in English.

Hi, guys, this is teacher Harry and welcome back to my English lessons where I try to help you to get a much better understanding of the English language. 

Listen to the podcast Speak Better English with Harry or watch it on YouTube at Learn English with Harry.

Ways to say I think

advanced ways to say 'I think' in English

So what am I going to talk to you about today? Well, we’re going to look at expressions with ‘I think’ or more advanced ways to say ‘I think’ in English.

So I’ve got about 10 or 11 of these, I’ll go down through them as I always do, give them to an hour give you a quick explanation (or not so quick) of each of them.

If you have any problems with them later on, you still don’t understand, come back to me or send a comment. 

Some of these are more formal than others, some of them are less formal. So I’ll try and give you some indication about those as we go through them. Okay, so let me start.

For the first one, 

in my opinion

Meaning: make it very clear that this is your view

Well, it’s very obvious when we want to tell somebody what we think, or we want to give a detailed explanation of something, we might just say, ‘Well, in my opinion…’

You might want to stress it and change the intonation if you want to be really strong.

‘In MY opinion….’ and you emphasise the MY. Particularly, if you just want to make a point or clarify something. 

In my opinion, I think we should do this.

as far as I’m concerned

Meaning: a little bit more formal, means this is what you believe in, this is your view

So this could be any type of discussion you’re having in a work environment, with your family, with friends, whatever it might be. No matter what has happened, no matter what other people have said, this is the view that you have, and you’re going to stick to it.

So as far as I’m concerned, I’m still going to turn up tomorrow at the time that I usually do.

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‘I think’ suggests a little bit of uncertainty. If we want to be really strong, we can use

I believe (that)

Meaning: this is a really, really strong statement

Don’t say ‘I think’ during job interviews in English. If you’re talking about your strengths or weaknesses or some point of view, say I believe, have conviction. Conviction means be strong in your view, be strong in your opinion, what you believe.

I believe that what the government should do is this…

I believe that everybody has the right as they do to self-respect.

I believe that everybody’s opinion should be respected. 

The next one is a little bit uncertain, 

it seems/appears to me

Meaning: it might not be accurate, it might not be true, but this is what you think

It appears to me that they’re only doing that because somebody else did it.

It seems to me that it would be better if they did it another way.

When we use it seems or it appears to me, it turns it into a little softer. It’s a little less direct here. If you want to be direct, use I believe.

advanced ways to say 'I think' in English

Advanced ways to say 'I think' in English. Study English advanced level. English lessons on Zoom. www.englishlessonviaskype.com #learnenglish #englishlessons #EnglishTeacher #vocabulary #ingles

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Next,

I feel that

Meaning: you’re expressing a real personal opinion about something that you feel personally, inside

I feel it’s important for me to voice my opinion.

I feel it’s important for me to tell people when I believe they are wrong.

So these are your thoughts. It’s a little bit more emotional. You’re expressing your emotions a little bit stronger when you use that word ‘feel’ because feeling is about emotions.

I feel that you don’t listen to me, I have the feeling that you don’t appreciate my point of view.

I assume (that)

Meaning: there is a certain amount of guarantee that whatever is happening is correct

You might not be 100% absolutely certain, but there’s a belief that something is going to happen, or something is correct. 

I assume that they are going to give us a holiday on Monday because we worked the previous bank holiday.

This is what they did the previous year, or this is the action that they’ve taken previously. So it’s a good reason to believe that this is what they’ll do this time.

I assume that when as many people as possible are vaccinated, the government will allow people to move around more freely.

You can assume that based on certain things that have happened, your beliefs, your views, your thoughts, your intellect, the way that you have studied it.

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Next

from my point of view

Meaning: here we’re making it very personal; it may not be the point of view of your colleagues or your family

From my point of view, it is important that you respect what your parents want.

From my point of view, if they want you to study for a few hours after school, you should respect that.

It’s from my point of view, not everybody would share the same opinion or the same view.

Next, a little more informal,

if you ask me

Meaning: there’s a belief that people are not going to ask you, but that’s your opinion

If you ask me, I think the world is crazy.

If you ask me, I really think we’ve made a serious mistake here. What we should have done is…

Depending on how you put the intonation you can make it more aggressive or stronger, or just more even.

advanced ways to say 'I think' in English

Advanced ways to say 'I think' in English. Study English advanced level. English lessons on Zoom. www.englishlessonviaskype.com #learnenglish #englishlessons #EnglishTeacher #vocabulary #ingles

Next, a little bit more formal,

I consider

I consider that to be rather insulting.

I consider that to be inappropriate at this particular time.

I consider that language to be inappropriate for the classroom.

I consider this to be the end of the matter.

This is a way if you want to cut your you’ve had an argument with your kids. Or you’ve had an argument with your colleagues, and you want to draw a line.

as far as I can see/tell

Meaning: used for expressing our opinion with perhaps some limited information

It means based on the information we have, which may not be the full story, this is my opinion.

As far as I can see, I think they’re both in the wrong.

As far as I can tell, they are always arguing. It’s not a surprise to me that they’ve decided to split up.

advanced ways to say 'I think' in English

to my/in mind

Meaning: this is a way of us telling somebody, this is my opinion, this is what I would do. And again, it’s personal to you.

To my mind, I don’t think it’s the right way to do it. I think you should perhaps write the letter, complete your CV and then put it on LinkedIn.

To my mind, what you should do is spend a little bit of time every day, looking through the internet, see what positions are vacant. 

And then the last one is on my list,

personally speaking

Meaning: this is what you think; you don’t know/care what other people think

Personally speaking, if it was me, this is what I would do. 

Personally speaking, if it was me, I’d finish your course.

advanced ways to say 'I think' in English

And then the very last because I added it at the beginning, is this quite quirky or unusual expression.

your two cents worth

Meaning: (old-fashioned) use this phrase when you want to express your opinion, even though it might not be worth much

Okay, anybody else wants to add their two cents worth?

So the person might be a little bit annoyed or is a little bit frustrated. They just want the meeting to end. So he really wants anybody else with an opinion.

Well, excuse me, can I add my two cents worth? 

So, let me go through advanced ways to say ‘I think’ in English again with you:

  • in my opinion
  • as far as I’m concerned 
  • I believe that (something) 
  • it seems/appears to me
  • I feel that 
  • I assume that
  • from my point of view. 
  • if you ask me
  • I consider (that)
  • as far as I can see/tell
  • in my/to mind
  • personally speaking
  • your two cents worth

All different ways in which we can ‘I think’ in English.  

You can practise these English phrases. Some of them, as I said, are quite common. Some of them are formal, others are informal, but they’re all ways in which you can express your opinions or beliefs. 

As always, if you want to contact me, you can do so on www.englishlessonviaskype.com

Very happy to hear your comments. Very happy to get some recommendations of something that you’re having a problem with so that I can include them in future podcasts and future videos on the YouTube channel. Okay, well thanks for listening. Thanks for watching. Join me again soon.

More information

For more information on English grammar rules, English collocations and English idioms, check out the links below:

12 English idioms related to TIME

English expressions with LOOK

You can always study English advanced level at Learning English with the BBC.

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