Word.ws English Dictionary

laid up

laid up adjective: unable to move about normally due to illness or injury, especially when confined to bed. Also the simple past and past participle of lay up.

Adjective

laid up (not comparable)

  1. Unable to move about normally due to illness or injury, especially when confined to bed.
    • For days Ailie had an absent eye and a sad face, and it so fell out that in all that time young Heriotside, who had scarce missed a day, was laid up with a broken arm and never came near her.1902, John Buchan, The Outgoing of the Tide
    • Flesh occasionally feels stalemated, more laid up than at home.2000, Arthur Michael Saltzman, This Mad "instead": Governing Metaphors in Contemporary American Fiction, →ISBN, page 12
  2. Stored at a dock or other place of safety.
    • The ship was laid up until repairs could commence.

Also used as

laid up is also the simple past and past participle of lay up.

Questions about laid up

What does laid up mean?
Laid up means unable to move about normally due to illness or injury, especially when confined to bed.
What part of speech is laid up?
Laid up is an adjective.

Words near laid up in the dictionary

  1. laid the table
  2. laid to
  3. laid to heart
  4. laid to rest
  5. laid tracks
  6. laid up
  7. laid up in lavender
  8. laid up with
  9. laid waste
  10. laid-back
  11. laid-off

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: laid up (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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