kick up
verb
Simple meaning
To rear back.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
kikuhpSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
ˈkɪˈkʌp
This word is pronounced essentially the same in American and British English, so one transcription covers both.
IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) is a standard way of writing speech sounds.
Definition
Everyday modern meanings first, grouped by part of speech.
verb
informalfigurativelytransitive
Cause to rise by kicking
informalfigurativelytransitive
To stir up (trouble), to cause (a disturbance).
of a horse
To rear back; to become more active or restless; to speed up.
transitiveintransitive
Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see kick, up.
informalintransitive
To show anger (about something).
informalintransitiveus
To function improperly; to show signs of disorder; (of an illness) to flare up.
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: Cause to rise by kicking
Used this way, kick up is a reasonably familiar word that usually carries little praise or criticism of its own. It turns up most in everyday conversation and social media or informal writing contexts.
- Emotional tone
- Neutral
- Formality
- Casual
- Intensity
- Not strongly marked
- How common
- Moderately common
- Connotation
- Playful
- Usage feel
- Casual and conversational
Where it naturally appears
- Everyday conversation
- Social media/informal writing
Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.
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Dictionary data from Wiktionary via the Free Dictionary API. Simple meanings, combinations and word intelligence are built from verified reference data, no AI is used to load this page.