stop up

Idioms  

1. Fill a hole or gap, block an opening or passage. For example, We need to stop up the chinks in the walls, or The sink is stopped up; it won't drain. This idiom was at first put simply as stop, the adverb up being added only in the early 1700s.

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Example Sentences

Greed also causes overleveraging: You keep adding to a winning position without moving your stop up to protect profits, then suddenly bad news hits, and what was your biggest winner yesterday wipes you out today.

From MarketWatch • Jan. 28, 2026

In the ninth, Suarez hit a two-out double off Jose Leclerc, but Nathaniel Lowe made a diving stop up the line at first base stop a hard-hit grounder Dominic Canzone’s bat.

From Seattle Times • Sep. 24, 2023

"I now put the food away when I go to bed, but in the morning I've found the towel I've used to stop up the gap is pulled out and chewed too."

From BBC • Apr. 3, 2023

And so we let crickets be crickets and I stop up my ears.

From Slate • Feb. 26, 2022

He saw Faber stop up his own breath for fear of drawing that ghost into his own body, perhaps, being contaminated with the phantom exhalations and odours of a running man.

From "Fahrenheit 451" by Ray Bradbury

Related Words

• arrest
• bar
• blockade
• clog
• close
• close off
• cut off
• deter
• halt
• hinder
• hold up
• impede
• intercept
• prevent
• stall
• stop
• thwart