Word.ws English Dictionary

welling up

welling up is the present participle and gerund of well up.

Meaning of well up

Verb

well up (third-person singular simple present wells up, present participle welling up, simple past and past participle welled up)

  1. (intransitive) To gradually or steadily flow upwards or outwards so as to begin to fill or overflow something.
    • Oil was welling up out of the borehole.
  2. (broadly, figuratively) To accumulate within one, to the point of overwhelming one.
    • Emotion welled up inside me.

See all 3 meanings of well up

Questions about welling up

What is welling up the present participle and gerund of?
Welling up is the present participle and gerund of well up.

Words near welling up in the dictionary

  1. wellied
  2. wellied it
  3. wellies
  4. wellies it
  5. welling
  6. welling up
  7. Wellingborough
  8. Wellingrove
  9. wellings
  10. wellington
  11. wellington boot

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: welling up (page history and authors); well 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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