cheer up

Idioms

Become or make happy, raise the spirits of, as in This fine weather should cheer you up. This term may also be used as an imperative, as Shakespeare did (2 Henry IV, 4:4): “My sovereign lord, cheer up yourself.” [Late 1500s]

Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

And as an artist, she’s glad that, even as a 16-year-old just beginning her career, she never gave in to the pressure to cheer up her tracks.

From The Wall Street Journal • Oct. 29, 2025

“Maybe the current global situation, be it geopolitical or macroeconomic, does not lead people to cheer up and to open bottles of Champagne.”

From Salon • Jan. 21, 2025

Voters started to cheer up about the economy.

From Slate • Sep. 6, 2024

About midway through “The Sixth Sense,” Bruce Willis’ Malcolm, a compassionate child psychologist, attempts to cheer up Haley Joel Osment’s Cole, a disturbed boy struggling with secrets he’s too scared to reveal.

From Los Angeles Times • Aug. 6, 2024

“Check it out. I bet they did that to cheer up Mr. Lemoncello.”

From "Mr. Lemoncello's Library Olympics" by Chris Grabenstein

Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023