Is it necessary that hydrolysis of ester will only take place in excess of water?

I was given a question on chemical kinetics in which the statement was given-
"The Concentration of water in hydrolysis of ester does not change to much extent"
I marked the statement to be false because I thought that the hydrolysis need not take place in excess water, there might be a condition where I could take 1 mole water and 1 mole of ester and still carry on the reaction.
Although it might be that the hydrolysis may not go in forward direction to much extent in such a case, but still reaction would take place.




No, it is not necessary to have excess water for reaction to occur. **Yet** usually what books and sources mean by hydrolysis means that water as a solvent reacts with the compound. As you may know without large excess of water you wouldn't be able to go very far with the reaction (Low Yield due to equilibrium).


This is a reason why ester hydrolysis is also a pseudo first order reaction due to large excess of water which does not change effectively as reaction proceeds. Just know that hydrolysis requires excess of water. That is what is meant by hydrolysis. As for your question in the book, it is useless to spend time on such questions demanding plain answers without reasoning.


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