bottom-up

American  

[bot-uhm--uhp] / ˈbɒt əm ˈʌp /

adjective

1. of, relating to, or originating with the common people, nonprofessionals, or the lower ranks of an organization.

   The five-day workweek was a bottom-up movement that business leaders and politicians finally supported.

2. organized or proceeding from smaller, more detailed units to the larger, more general structure.

   His bottom-up approach to research involves immersing himself in communities to better understand the lives of local entrepreneurs.

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bottom-up British  

adjective

1. from the lowest level of a hierarchy or process to the top

   a bottom-up approach to corporate decision-making

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Etymology

Origin of bottom-up

First recorded in 1930–35 as an adjective and in 1890–95 as an adverb, both deriving from the phrase “from the bottom up ”

Example Sentences

That bottom-up approach creates delays and a lag time in processing ballots.

From Los Angeles Times • Mar. 22, 2026

Having said that, we do an annual, bottom-up, internal-rate-of-return analysis for almost every S&P 500 company once a year.

From Barron's • Jan. 9, 2026

Elsewhere, countries with fragile currencies are seeing bottom-up adoption.

From MarketWatch • Dec. 2, 2025

Built through a bottom-up molecular engineering strategy, they combine tightly controlled size with a defined number of surface ligands to create a multivalent platform with highly specific interactions at cellular receptors.

From Science Daily • Oct. 30, 2025

Dr. Anderson has found that babies mostly glance at television because of the bottom-up system—in other words, they are responding to changes in sound and light.

From "A Deadly Wandering: A Mystery, a Landmark Investigation, and the Astonishing Science of Attention in the Digital Age" by Matt Richtel

Related Words

• reversed
• upturned