noun, verb ·Moderate ·College level

Definitions

Noun

1. 1
   Maintenance; the act or effort of keeping something in good and working condition. uncountable, usually

   "I would enjoy having a swimming pool, but I don't want to deal with the upkeep."

2. 2
   activity involved in maintaining something in good working order wordnet
3. 3
   the act of sustaining life by food or providing a means of subsistence wordnet

Verb

1. 1
   To maintain (something) or keep it in good repair. British, transitive

   "Do you know how to upkeep a boat?"

Synonyms

All synonyms

caresustenanceaidbackback upbacking

Example

More examples

"The regular upkeep of our servers is paramount to ensuring high uptime."

Etymology

From up + keep.

Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.