Word.ws English Dictionary

come up

come up verb: to emerge or become known, especially unexpectedly.

Verb

come up (third-person singular simple present comes up, present participle coming up, simple past came up, past participle come up)

  1. (idiomatic, intransitive) To emerge or become known, especially unexpectedly.
    • Unless anything comes up, I'll be there every day this week.
  2. (intransitive) To be revealed to have a certain value, quality, or status.
    • The movie didn't come up to our expectations.
    • They've looked for him everywhere, and come up dry.
  3. (intransitive) To come to attention and present oneself; to arrive or appear.
    • At some point in the conversation my name came up, and I readily agreed to their proposition.
    • Be ready for when your turn comes up.
  4. (intransitive) To appear (before a judge or court).
    • He came up before a judge and was fined a thousand dollars.
  5. (intransitive) To draw near in time.
    • The summer holidays are coming up.
  6. (intransitive) To approach a time or scheduled event.
    • We're coming up on the interview in the last half-hour of the program.
    • In 1883, the contract came up for renewal, the L.N.W.R. received it, and the City of Dublin Steam Packet Company was set aside. But there was a certain miasma of secrecy about the affair, so that many, especially in Ireland, looked for information and insisted on getting it.1960 May, K. A. Murray, “Carlisle Pier, Dun Laoghaire”, in Railway Magazine, page 305
  7. (intransitive) To reach in height.
    • You have to come up to here to ride this roller-coaster.
    • He only comes up around this high.
  8. (intransitive) To rise (above the horizon).
    • It'll be warmer once the sun comes up.
  9. (UK, intransitive, slang) To begin to feel the effects of a recreational drug.
    • I could tell from her expression that she was coming up already.
  10. (UK, intransitive, Oxford University) To arrive at the university. (Compare go down, send down.)
  11. (intransitive, slang, African-American Vernacular) To happen or occur.
    • His shift came up, so he had to go to work.
  12. (intransitive, slang, African-American Vernacular) To grow up; to experience a childhood.
    • I came up in Baltimore.
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  1. (intransitive, slang, African-American Vernacular) To do well or be successful.
    • Watch out for him, he's been coming up lately.
  2. Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see come, up.
    • I came up the ladder carefully, holding the bucket in my right hand.
  3. (intransitive) To come towards; to approach.
    • I was standing on the corner when Nick came up and asked for a cigarette.
    • Racing around to come up behind you again1973 March 1, Roger Waters, “Time”, in The Dark Side of the Moon, performed by Pink Floyd

Noun

come up (plural come ups)

  1. An opportunity
    • I'm gonna pop some tags
      Only got 20$ in my pocket
      I'm, I'm, I'm huntin', lookin' for a come up
      This is fucking awesome2012, Macklemore & Ryan Lewis, “Thrift Shop”

come up meaning in Tamil, Malayalam, Kannada and Arabic

come up in Tamil

வா, தலையெடு

come up in Malayalam

occur, arise, happen
ഉദിക്കുക, ഉണ്ടാകുക, ഭവിക്കുക, വിളയുക, സംഭവിക്കുക, സംജാതമാവുക

come up in Kannada

ಪ್ರಸ್ತಾಪಕ್ಕೆ ಬರು, ಆಗು, ಉಂಟಾಗು, ಮೂಡಿಬರು, ಅಭಿವೃದ್ಧಿ ಹೊಂದು, ಮೇಲೆ ಬರು

come up in Arabic

non-idiomatic
طَلَعَ ṭalaʕa

Antonyms of come up

Forms of come up

Verb
third-person singular presentcomes up
present participlecoming up
pastcame up
past participlecome up
Noun
pluralcome ups

Words formed from come up

Questions about come up

What does come up mean?
Come up means to emerge or become known, especially unexpectedly.
What is come up in Tamil?
Come up in Tamil is வா, தலையெடு. See Come up meaning in Tamil.
What part of speech is come up?
Come up can be a verb or a noun.
What is the past tense of come up?
The past tense of come up is came up.

Words near come up in the dictionary

  1. come true
  2. come under
  3. come undone
  4. come unhinged
  5. come unstuck
  6. come up
  7. come up against
  8. come up and bite
  9. come up and bitten
  10. come up from behind
  11. come up roses

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: come up (page history and authors); come up (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); come up (Olam, E.K. Kurup corpus) (dataset and license); come up (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-au-come up.ogg.

Cite this entry: “come up.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/come_up. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.