high gear

Idioms

A state of maximum activity, energy, or force. For example, His mind was in high gear as he studied for the medical exam, or The political campaign is finally moving into high gear. This expression alludes to the high gear of an engine transmission, used at the fastest speeds.

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.

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high gear

On the heels of its high-profile initial public offering in June, Elon Musk's SpaceX plans to shift into high gear with a 14th test flight featuring ambitious goals.

From Barron's ● Sep. 28, 2026

The global shortage of fuel that caused prices to rise also kicked U.S. refiners into high gear.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 7, 2026

As second-quarter earnings kick into high gear this week, Wall Street analysts seem to be feeling pretty good, despite ongoing concerns about the impact of the Iran war.

From MarketWatch ● Jul. 12, 2026

More recently, Anthropic’s Mythos and other frontier artificial-intelligence models, capable of finding thousands of software bugs at machine speed, are putting find-and-fix strategies into high gear.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 16, 2026

Creeping, not letting the engine slide into high gear, he drove around the corner.

From "Song of Solomon" by Toni Morrison

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