Object–subject word order

In linguistic typology, object–subject (OS) word order, also called O-before-S or patient–agent word order, is a word order in which the object appears before the subject. OS is notable for its statistical rarity as a default or predominant word order among natural languages. Languages with predominant OS word order display properties that distinguish them from languages with subject–object (SO) word order.

The three OS word orders are VOS, OVS, and OSV. Collectively, these three orders comprise only around 2.9% of the world's languages. SO word orders (SOV, SVO, VSO) are significantly more common, comprising approximately 83.3% of the world's languages (the remaining 13.7% have free word order).

Despite their low relative frequency, languages that use OS order by default can be found across a wide variety of families, including Nilotic, Austronesian, Mayan, Oto-Manguean, Chumashan, Arawakan, Cariban, Tupi–Guarani, Jê, Nadahup, and Chonan.