hold up

phrasal verb · hold-up noun

16 meanings of hold up

1
cause delayphrasal verbtransitive
To delay someone or something by getting in the way or keeping them back.
Customs officials held up the shipment for three days while they checked the paperwork.
A slow truck in front of us was holding us up the whole way.
Similardelay, detain, slow
Note
Like most phrasal verbs it splits around a pronoun: a noun object can sit on either side of up (the accident held up traffic, held traffic up), but a pronoun has to go in the middle, so it held us up, never it held up us. The passive is common too, especially of journeys and races: we were held up at the border.
2
waitphrasal verbcolloquialintransitive
To stop and wait, or to put off doing something for a while.
Hold up, let me grab my jacket before we go.
We should hold up here until the rest of the group catches up.
Similarwait, stop, pause
3
stop and robphrasal verbidiomatictransitive
To rob a person or business by stopping them and making threats, usually with a weapon.
Masked gunmen held up an armored truck outside the mall.
Outlaws used to hold up stagecoaches on the lonely mountain road.
Similarrob
4
keep raisedphrasal verbtransitive
To bear the weight of something so that it stays up, or to raise it.
Steel cables hold up the entire span of the bridge.
He held up his daughter so she could see over the crowd at the parade.
Similarsupport, raise, lift, bear
5
survive testingphrasal verbidiomaticintransitive
To withstand pressure, wear, or examination without failing.
Her alibi held up even after detectives checked every detail.
Cheap phone cases rarely hold up to daily use.
Similarlast, endure, survive
Oppositefail
Note
The test usually follows to: a figure holds up to scrutiny, a fabric holds up to heavy use. Without to, it says the same of an alibi or an argument that survives checking. Its most familiar form is a negative verdict on a claim, that it does not hold up to scrutiny, which is a polite way of calling it wrong.
6
copephrasal verbidiomaticintransitive
To stay calm and keep going in spite of hardship or distress.
Friends kept calling to ask how he was holding up after the layoffs.
The family held up remarkably well through months of uncertainty.
Similarcope, manage
Note
It is most familiar as a question of concern, how are you holding up?, asked of someone going through a loss, an illness or a long strain. The progressive is the natural form, because the hardship is still going on; the past, they held up well, looks back once it is over.
7
a delaynoun · hold-upcolloquialcountable
A delay, or a period spent waiting.
After a two-hour hold-up on the runway, the flight finally took off.
The project ran into hold-ups at almost every stage of approval.
Similardelay, postponement
Note
The noun is hyphenated while the verb stays two words, so the same impatience comes out as what's the hold-up? or as what's holding us up? The first is the stock question of anyone kept waiting, in a queue, on a runway or at a stalled meeting.
8
armed robberynoun · hold-upslangcountable
A robbery in which the victims are threatened with a gun.
The bank teller pressed the silent alarm as soon as the hold-up began.
Police linked the gun to a string of hold-ups at convenience stores.
Similarstickup
Note
The crime takes its name from what the robber does, holding the victims up, and "This is a hold-up!" is the stock line of the robber in fiction. Joseph Heller's Catch-22 counts being shot in hold-ups among the violent ways to die. Stickup belongs to the same slang; in police statements and news reports the neutral term is armed robbery.
9
age wellphrasal verbintransitive
Of a book, film, or other work, to keep its appeal over time without seeming dated.
The special effects look primitive now, but the story holds up remarkably well.
Few sitcoms from the 1990s hold up as well as this one.
Similarendure, last
Note
Critics use it of films, books, albums and games that still work for a later audience; the opposite verdict is that a work has dated. It often follows a concession about age, as in an old film, but it holds up, and it readily takes well: the story holds up remarkably well.
10
do your partphrasal verbidiomatictransitive
To do everything one promised as one's own part of an agreement.
The landlord held up his end of the agreement and fixed the heating within a week.
If the suppliers don't hold up their part of the contract, the whole project stalls.
Similarfulfill, honor, keep
Note
The object is usually fixed: you hold up your end of the bargain, or your part of a deal or contract. The picture is of two people carrying something between them, and if one lets their end drop, the whole load falls. That is why the phrase suits a complaint: he's not holding up his end.

11
show as examplephrasal verbfigurativelytransitive
To put someone or something forward for attention, as if lifting it up for people to see.
Critics held up the new law as proof that the government had lost its way.
The company's founder is often held up as a model of frugal leadership.
Similarcite, present, hail
Note
The words after the object do most of the work: you hold someone up as an example or a model, or a person is held up for public ridicule. Without that as or for, held up drifts back toward delayed or lifted, so the complement is what tells the reader which meaning is in play.
12
stay high (numbers)phrasal verbintransitive
To keep pace and not fall behind or lose ground.
Share prices held up surprisingly well while the rest of the market fell.
Analysts expect tourism in the region to hold up despite the rise in fuel costs.
Oppositeslump, decline
13
stockingsnoun · hold-upcountableplural
Women's stockings made to stay up on their own, without a garter belt.
The shop sells hold-ups in a range of sizes, all with a silicone band at the top.
She switched to hold-up stockings so that no clips would show under her short dress.
14
traffic jamnoun · hold-upNigeriacountable
A traffic jam, with vehicles stuck or crawling along the road.
Commuters spent three hours in the hold-up on the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway.
Heavy rain caused a hold-up that stretched from Ikeja to Ojota.
Similarjam, tailback, gridlock
Note
In Nigerian English hold-up is a plain everyday word for a traffic jam, the kind that turns a short commute into hours. Elsewhere a hold-up on the road would be heard as a delay or even a robbery, so for readers outside Nigeria traffic jam is the clearer choice.
15
card gamenoun · hold-upcountable
The tactic of keeping back a card that could win the current trick so that it can be used later.
Declarer made the contract with a classic hold-up, refusing to take the ace until the third round of the suit.
Defenders can use hold-ups too, ducking the first lead to cut declarer off from dummy.
Note
Bridge writers often close it up as holdup. The textbook case is in notrump: declarer, holding the ace of the suit the defenders lead, ducks until one defender has none left, so that player cannot return the suit later. The play has a cost, though; Terence Reese describes a holdup that made declarer lose control and go down.
16
nuclear materialnoun · hold-upcountable or uncountable
The total amount of nuclear material held within a separation plant.
Before decommissioning, engineers had to recover the uranium hold-up from the plant's cascades.
An unexpectedly large hold-up made it hard to close the plant's material balance.
Note
Plant operators also call it the in-process inventory: the material lodged in a plant's pipes, tanks and filters while it runs. It cannot be weighed where it sits, so it is measured from outside, with instruments such as a portable gamma counter, and it has to be counted whenever inspectors check that nothing has gone missing.

Practice

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Origin

Formed from the verb hold up.