heat up

1. Become acute or intense, as in If inflation heats up, the interest rate will surely rise, or The debate over the budget was heating up. [Early 1200s]

Example Sentences

Annual inflation heated up slightly in recent months, though not as much as economists had expected.

Read more on The Wall Street Journal

Plus, it needed to reduce its reliance on the West for critical technology as its rivalry with the U.S. heated up.

Read more on Barron's

It’s an HFO, not an HFC, and has a lower propensity to heat up the planet when released into the atmosphere.

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Fired in part by the generative AI surge, competition is heating up to dominate automated driving.

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As the AI race heats up, companies are pouring hundreds of billions of dollars into data centers, talent, research and development.

Read more on Los Angeles Times

Related Words

• agitate 
• arouse 
• disturb 
• embitter 
• enrage 
• exacerbate 
• fire up 
• foment 
• ignite 
• incense 
• infuriate 
• intensify 
• irritate 
• kindle 
• provoke 
• rile 
• roil 
• rouse 
• stimulate 
• worsen