Synonyms

muck-up

American

[muhk-uhp] / ˈmʌkˌʌp /

noun

Informal.

a bungled or disordered situation; foul-up.

muck up British

verb

(tr) to ruin or spoil; make a mess of
(intr) to misbehave

"Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged" 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

muck up Idioms

Bungle, damage, make a mess of, as in Don't let him write the review; he's sure to muck it up. This idiom alludes to the verb muck in the sense of “spread manure on.” [Early 1900s] For a synonym, see foul up.

Etymology

Origin of muck-up

First recorded in 1925–30; noun use of verb phrase muck up

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.

Not even the best picture muck-up during the 2017 Academy Awards could compare to the devastation that the comedian/game show host/relationship advice huckster inflicted upon Columbian contestant and eventual runner-up Ariadna Gutierrez, who saw her life-long dream come true, only for it to be ripped away a few moments later.

From The Guardian

“If it was an alien spacecraft, it was the Brexit of alien spacecraft. It was a complete muck-up,” says Fitzsimmons.

From The Verge

I think the IOC made a complete muck-up of it.

From BBC

“Mayoral leadership is very visible, it’s about walking down the street and somebody saying ‘you’ve made a right muck-up of that’.

From The Guardian

"We've made a big enough muck-up to do that for this year so we must not do that again."

From Reuters

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