glow-up
- 1A major, impressive transformation in the appearance, talent, power, or similar qualities of someone or something.
Between the new haircut and his newfound confidence, his senior-year glow-up was hard to miss.
The team's glow-up from last-place joke to title contender took just one season.
Similartransformation, makeover
Oppositeglow-down
Note
The noun probably came first, modeled on blow-up, with the verb glow up formed from it afterward, the reverse of how blow-up arose. You can achieve a glow-up or give something one, and it reaches well beyond looks: Hannah Jewell's She Caused a Riot (2018) credits Empress Theodora with one of the most impressive in Byzantine history. It is slang, at home in casual talk; its opposite is a glow-down.
- 2To go through a major, impressive transformation in appearance, talent, power, or similar qualities.
Some of my classmates have glowed up so much since graduation that I barely recognize them.
Fans love watching child actors glow up over the years of a long-running show.
Similarblossom
Note
As a verb it is two words, and the endings go on glow: she glows up, he has glowed up. The hyphen belongs to the noun, so someone who glows up has had a glow-up. It takes no object and suits a look back over the years: classmates who have glowed up since freshman year, a cast that glowed up in the best way.
- 3To give someone or something a major, impressive transformation in appearance, talent, power, or similar qualities.
With the latest update, the camera app has been glowed up with sharper night shots and softer portrait lighting.
The new owners hired a designer to glow up the tired old diner with neon signs and red booths.
Note
The passive is at home here: Alexis C. Madrigal wrote in 2019 that the iPhone's Portrait mode "has been glowed up." In the active, a short object sits between the two words (glow it up) and a longer one follows them (glow up the tired old diner). Drop the object and you have the intransitive verb, where the subject is the one transformed.
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Origin
From glow + up, modelled on nouns formed from verbs such as blow-up. Historically it was probably not formed from the verb glow up, which was itself back-formed from the noun.