bring up

verb

brought up; bringing up; brings up

transitive verb

1

: to bring (a person) to maturity through nurturing care and education

2

: to cause to stop suddenly

3

a

: to bring to attention : introduce

b

computers : to cause (something, such as a file or picture) to appear on a computer screen

… you can make any picture that it displays into wallpaper by right-clicking with the arrow over the art to bring up a box with a "Set as wallpaper" choice.

—Barry Popik

4

: vomit

intransitive verb

: to stop suddenly

Synonyms

• breed
• foster
• nourish
• nurse
• raise
• rear

Examples of bring up in a Sentence

it takes an immense commitment and a lot of love to bring up a child properly

I hate to bring this up, but we're running short of money.

Recent Examples on the Web

According to the Financial Times, the Trump Administration first brought up the brothers’ case in a phone call with the Romanian government in early February. —Miranda Jeyaretnam, TIME, 28 Feb. 2025

Mercury retrograde in Aries on March 15th could bring up past conversations or miscommunications. —Dossé-Via Trenou, refinery29.com, 27 Feb. 2025

For example, Panos demoed on stage how to check if somebody walked the dog yesterday, and Alexa Plus brought up recordings of people walking dogs outside his home. —Prakhar Khanna, Forbes, 26 Feb. 2025

But Bonds talked Mahomes out of it, bringing up the fact that the quarterback had notable success with the Mohawk. —Jackson Thompson, Fox News, 26 Feb. 2025

Word History

First Known Use

14th century, in the meaning defined at transitive sense 1

Rhymes for bring up

• backup
• blowup
• breakup
• buildup
• checkup
• cleanup
• holdup
• hookup
• lineup
• lockup
• makeup
• markup

Kids Definition

bring up

verb

1

: to bring to maturity through care and education

bring up a child

2

: to bring to attention : introduce

I hate to keep bringing this up

Medical Definition

bring up

transitive verb

(ˈ)briŋ-ˈəp 

: vomit