tear up

verb

tore up; torn up; tearing up; tears up

transitive verb

: to damage, remove, or effect an opening in

tore up the street to lay a new water main

: to perform or compete with great success on, in, or against

couples tearing up the dance floor

a batter who's tearing up the league

Examples of tear up in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web Selena Gomez tears up during John Leguizamo's Emmys speech Earlier this year, the Emmy-winning comedian penned an open letter published in The New York Times, urging the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences for diverse media representation at awards shows. —

Patrick Ryan, USA TODAY, 16 Sep. 2024 The end of the video reveals that the support served him well, showing performance footage of Jelly Roll and Wallen tearing up the song onstage with ease. —

Jessica Nicholson, Billboard, 12 Aug. 2024 That means ever larger tracts of land have to be torn up to extract the same amount of copper, generating ever larger amounts of waste. —

Vince Beiser, WIRED, 22 Aug. 2024 The next balloon pop revealed a TV with a video message from Gabby, which made Tran tear up, too. —

Hannah Kirby, Journal Sentinel, 14 Aug. 2024 See all Example Sentences for tear up

These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'tear up.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.