Word.ws English Dictionary

making up

making up is the present participle and gerund of make up.

Meaning of make up

Verb

make up (third-person singular simple present makes up, present participle making up, simple past and past participle made up)

  1. To constitute, to compose.
    1. (transitive) To constitute the components of a whole.
      • The words "dream interpretation" […] remind one of all sorts of childish, superstitious notions, which make up the thread and woof of dream books, read by none but the ignorant and the primitive.1920, M. D. Eder, Dream Psychology, translation of original by Sigmund Freud
  2. (transitive) To compensate for (a deficiency, defect, etc.); to supply (something missing).
    • He can make up the time next week.
  3. (intransitive) To compensate (for).
    • What I lack in patience, I make up for in drive.
  4. To invent, to imagine, to concoct
    1. To invent or fabricate (a story, claim, etc.).
      • He was a great storyteller and could make up a story on the spot.

See all 18 meanings of make up

Questions about making up

What is making up the present participle and gerund of?
Making up is the present participle and gerund of make up.

Words near making up in the dictionary

  1. making tick
  2. making time
  3. making time with
  4. making tracks
  5. making trial of
  6. making up
  7. making up for lost time
  8. making up one's mind
  9. making up the numbers
  10. making up to
  11. making use

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: making up (page history and authors); make 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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Cite this entry: “making up.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/making_up. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.