play catch-up

idiom

: to try to reach the same position, score, etc., as a competitor after one has fallen behind

The team fell behind in the second inning and has had to play catch-up ever since.

The company has been trying to play a difficult game of catch-up ever since its competitor introduced the new product.

Examples of play catch-up in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

What’s remained is Cerebras’ insistence that its hardware outperforms graphics processing units, or GPUs, a market that Nvidia dominates but where Advanced Micro Devices is trying to play catch-up. —Jordan Novet, CNBC, 6 Oct. 2025

Science can only play catch-up, documenting the impacts long after the harm has occurred. —Literary Hub, 3 Oct. 2025

Poor starts have regularly forced Carolina, Cleveland, Miami, Kansas City, the Giants, New Orleans and Houston to play catch-up while averaging fewer than 10 points in the first half. —Andrew Greif, NBC news, 21 Sep. 2025

Getting ahead of these scams will be difficult, because cybersecurity workers often play catch-up to the latest criminal tactics. —Rachyl Jones, semafor.com, 29 Aug. 2025

Rhymes for play catch-up

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