What Does Take Up Mean?
Take up is a two-faced phrasal verb. It has two jobs you will meet all the time, and they do not behave the same way.
Job 1: start something new. You take up a hobby, a sport, a skill or a job. You can also take up an offer, which means you say yes to it.
Job 2: fill space or time. Something takes up room, minutes or attention. Nobody is starting anything here. Something is simply getting in the way.
My brother took up the drums last month.
She took up the invitation and came to the party.
The giant cardboard box takes up half the hallway.
Maths homework can take up a whole evening.
🗣️ Natural Examples
Grandma took up painting when she was seventy.
I want to take up swimming this summer.
Thanks for the offer. We would love to take you up on it.
The new bookcase takes up too much space.
Practising the piano takes up most of my Sunday.
✂️ Can You Separate It?
It depends on the meaning. This is the odd part.
Starting a hobby or accepting an offer: separable. With a pronoun, the pronoun goes in the middle.
✅ She took up chess.
✅ She took chess up. (possible, but less common)
✅ She took it up last year.
❌ She took up it last year.
Filling space or time: keep the two words together. The thing that gets filled comes straight after up.
✅ The sofa takes up too much room.
❌ The sofa takes too much room up.
🛠️ How to Use It
- Past tense: took up. Past participle: taken up. She has taken up running.
- Hobbies and skills: things you choose to start. Take up knitting. Take up the guitar.
- Offers: take someone up on an offer means to say yes to it. Let me take you up on that.
- Space and time: take up room, take up time, take up space. It takes up too much room is the most common pattern.
⚠️ Common Mistakes
A pronoun belongs in the middle when you start something.
❌ She took up it last year.
✅ She took it up last year.
Take up is for starting a hobby, not for doing one. Once you are already playing, you play.
❌ I take up football every Saturday.
✅ I play football every Saturday. (I took up football last year.)
Space is filled with take up, not take.
❌ The box takes half the hallway.
✅ The box takes up half the hallway.
💬 In a Conversation
Zara: Why is there a harp in the living room?
Ben: I took it up last week.
Zara: It takes up the whole room.
Ben: Yes. I mostly play it from the doorway.
💡 The OddLingo Trick
Ask yourself: is something starting, or is something filling?
- Starting a hobby or saying yes to an offer: you can split it. Take it up.
- Filling room or time: keep it whole. Takes up space.
👯 Similar Expressions
- start or begin: plain words for the hobby meaning. She started swimming.
- Take over: to start running something that was someone else's. Different from taking up a hobby, because you are replacing someone.
- Take after: to look or behave like an older relative. Another take phrase with a very different job.