come up

verb

came up; come up; coming up; comes up

intransitive verb

1

: rise sense 6

2

: to come near : make an approach

came up and introduced himself

3

: to rise in rank or status

an officer who came up from the ranks

4

a

: to come to attention or consideration

the question never came up

b

: to occur in the course of time

any problem that may come up

5

: to turn out to be

the coin came up tails

6

chiefly dialectal : grow up

Phrases

come up empty

: to fail to achieve a desired result

come up with

: to produce especially in dealing with a problem or challenge

came up with a solution

Synonyms

• come
• draw on
• close
• approach
• close in

Examples of come up in a Sentence

the girl came up to the counter and asked if she could have her order prepared to go

let me know if anything else comes up during the project

Recent Examples on the Web

Rather than being words on a wall, for example, these leadership behaviors come up in performance reviews. —Jessica Coacci, Fortune, 9 Oct. 2025

Kai Schreiber, the 16-year-old daughter of actors Naomi Watts and Liev Schreiber, is coming up in the modeling world one — or a dozen — runway shows at a time. —Michelle Lee, PEOPLE, 8 Oct. 2025

One team that consistently came up was the Golden State Warriors, who signed stretch forward Al Horford this offseason. —Cole Sullivan, MSNBC Newsweek, 8 Oct. 2025

Loosely based on the life of ping-pong great Marty Reisman, the film stars Timothée Chalamet as the fictional Marty Mauser, a table tennis wiz coming up in 1950s New York City with the hyper-determination to become a world champion. —Jon Blistein, Rolling Stone, 8 Oct. 2025

Word History

First Known Use

before the 12th century, in the meaning defined at sense 1

Rhymes for come up

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

Kids Definition

come up

verb

1

: rise entry 1 sense 4

the sun comes up in an hour

2

: to come near or approach

came up and introduced himself

3

: to come to attention : introduce sense 4

the question came up again