Word.ws English Dictionary

turn on the waterworks

turn on the waterworks verb: to start crying, especially in an insincere or annoying way.

Verb

turn on the waterworks (third-person singular simple present turns on the waterworks, present participle turning on the waterworks, simple past and past participle turned on the waterworks)

  1. (figuratively, informal) To start crying, especially in an insincere or annoying way.

Forms of turn on the waterworks

third-person singular presentturns on the waterworks
present participleturning on the waterworks
past participleturned on the waterworks
pastturned on the waterworks

Questions about turn on the waterworks

What does turn on the waterworks mean?
Turn on the waterworks means to start crying, especially in an insincere or annoying way.
What part of speech is turn on the waterworks?
Turn on the waterworks is a verb.
What is the past tense of turn on the waterworks?
The past tense of turn on the waterworks is turned on the waterworks.

Words near turn on the waterworks in the dictionary

  1. turn off
  2. turn on
  3. turn on its head
  4. turn on one's heel
  5. turn on red
  6. turn on the waterworks
  7. turn on, tune in, drop out
  8. turn one's back
  9. turn one's coat
  10. turn one's color
  11. turn one's hand to

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: turn on the waterworks (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: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-turn on the waterworks.wav.

Cite this entry: “turn on the waterworks.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/turn_on_the_waterworks. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.