Jump To:

• tie-up
  tie-up

  noun

  a temporary stoppage or slowing of business, traffic, telephone service, etc., as due to a strike, storm, or accident.
• tie up
  tie up

  verb

  (tr) to attach or bind securely with or as if with string, rope, etc

tie-up

American  

[tahy-uhp] / ˈtaɪˌʌp /

noun

• tie-ups
  plural

1. a temporary stoppage or slowing of business, traffic, telephone service, etc., as due to a strike, storm, or accident.

2. the act or state of tying up or the state of being tied up.

3. an involvement, connection, or entanglement.

   the tie-up between the two companies; his tie-up with the crime syndicate.

4. a mooring place; place where a boat may be tied up.

5. a cow barn with stalls.

6. a stall allotted to each cow in such a barn.

---

tie up British  

verb

1. (tr) to attach or bind securely with or as if with string, rope, etc

2. to moor (a vessel)

3. (tr; often passive) to engage the attentions of

   he's tied up at the moment and can't see you

4. (tr; often passive) to conclude (the organization of something)

   the plans for the trip were tied up well in advance

5. to come or bring to a complete standstill

6. (tr) to invest or commit (funds, etc) and so make unavailable for other uses

7. (tr) to subject (property) to conditions that prevent sale, alienation, or other action

---

noun

1. a link or connection

2. a standstill

3. an informal term for traffic jam

tie up Idioms  

1. Fasten securely; also, moor a ship. For example, Can you help me tie up these bundles? or The forecast was terrible, so we decided to tie up at the dock and wait out the storm . The first usage dates from the early 1500s, the nautical usage from the mid-1800s.

2. Impede the progress of, block, as in The accident tied up traffic for hours . [Late 1500s]

3. Keep occupied, engage, as in She was tied up in a meeting all morning . [Late 1800s]

4. Make funds or property inaccessible for other uses, as in Her cash is tied up in government bonds . [Early 1800s]

---

Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

• tie-ups
  plural

Etymology

Origin of tie-up

First recorded in 1705–15; noun use of verb phrase tie up

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

tie-up tie up tie-ups

In this, the year of the megadeal, barely a week in this newsroom has gone by without our covering some transformational tie-up or moonshot acquisition.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 19, 2026

The devices grabbed attention this summer after a marketing tie-up between Kylie Jenner, beauty mogul and member of the Kardashian dynasty, and tech giant Meta.

From Barron's ● Sep. 12, 2026

The announcement is also the latest tie-up between Germany's ailing auto industry and the defence sector, which is booming as countries build up their militaries to face an increasingly dangerous world.

From Barron's ● Sep. 7, 2026

The tie-up will also launch Serve’s robots in 100 Chicago restaurants and some in Virginia.

From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 17, 2026

Simpson stalked toward Luke, hoping for a tie-up.

From "We'll Fly Away" by Bryan Bliss

The states and Paramount will collide in court again on Aug. 3, when the judge takes up the expected motion for a preliminary injunction — which could tie up the deal for months.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 20, 2026

Nunez dismissed the idea, saying it would "tie up almost half of the security deployment".

From Barron's ● May 31, 2026

Back-to-back wins mean it looks increasingly likely Leeds will avoid the drop, so boss Daniel Farke will have to tie up a few loose ends with his goalkeepers.

From BBC ● Apr. 21, 2026

Giant food mergers often don’t go as advertised, but the McCormick-Unilever tie up could prove to be an exception.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 8, 2026

He wouldn’t say where, but they paddled for a good long time, then he said they should come out and tie up the canoe; that they’d have to swim the rest of the way.

From "Flying Through Water" by Mamle Wolo

The tie-ups were unveiled after CEO Jensen Huang spent the weekend eating barbecue in Seoul with the country's tech leaders and appearing on a popular TV show.

From Barron's ● Jun. 8, 2026

CEO Jim Farley says the automaker will expand the tie-ups while developing a plan for Chinese competition in the U.S.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 17, 2026

US artificial intelligence chip titan Nvidia unveiled tie-ups with Indian computing firms on Wednesday as tech companies rushed to announce deals and investments at a global AI conference in New Delhi.

From Barron's ● Feb. 18, 2026

Elliott’s intervention follows decades of dealmaking and investor agitation involving LSEG, including failed tie-ups with exchange operators in Canada, Germany and Hong Kong, and the purchase of Bloomberg competitor Refinitiv.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Feb. 11, 2026

That afternoon, when Mr. Zuckerman went to milk the cows and clean out the tie-ups, he was still thinking about what a wondrous pig he owned.

From "Charlotte's Web" by E.B. White

Related Words

• closure
• gridlock
• interruption
• layoff
• shutdown