tell on

phrasal verb

told on; telling on; tells on

1

informal : to tell someone in authority about the bad behavior or actions of (someone else)

Please don't tell on me.

2

: to have a noticeable effect on (someone or something)

The stress began to tell on her face/health.

Examples of tell on in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

How stories were told and how they were written or told on these platforms. —Dj Siddiqi, Forbes, 8 Oct. 2024

As its origin story is told on its website, Airbnb.org’s beginnings trace back to 2012, following Hurricane Sandy’s thorough pummeling of New York City. —Steven Aquino, Forbes, 8 Oct. 2024

With a tale that’s told on a such a theatrical and mythical level, of course the costuming echos the film’s ethos. —Tiffany Leigh, Forbes, 10 Sep. 2024

Shyamala and Donald were, after all, left-wing immigrants who attended and taught at some of the most prestigious schools in the country, a litany of identities that, together, read like a hack joke that Greg Gutfeld would tell on his late-night Fox News comedy show. —Jay Caspian Kang, The New Yorker, 26 July 2024