crack on

English

Pronunciation

• Audio (AU)

  (file)

Verb

crack on (third-person singular simple present cracks on, present participle cracking on, simple past and past participle cracked on)

1. (intransitive, idiomatic, often with 'with') To continue at a task briskly or promptly.

   Naked Twister will have to wait. I must crack on with my essay.

   • 1888, Kipling, The Madness of Private Ortheris:

     What's the use of cracking-on for nothing? Would you slip it now if you got the chance?

   • 2007 March 6, Julie Rutterford, Life on Mars, Season 2, Episode 3:

     Landlady: You're not stoppin' for a brew?
     Gene Hunt: No thanks, love. Better crack on.

   • 2023 March 22, “Select Committee wants electrification at the heart of low-carbon initiative”, in RAIL, number 979, page 8:

     "We strongly urge the Government to crack on with projects for electrifying lines throughout the UK or identify alternative lower-carbon motive power solutions."

2. To continue apace.

   The project is really cracking on.

   • 2022 December 14, Pip Dunn, “Caroline is ready for inspection...”, in RAIL, number 972, page 51:

     We crack on eastbound, passing the station at Worksop and that at Retford Low Level (I'm following the route with great interest thanks to my Quail atlas).

3. (transitive, dated) To put on.

   to crack on more sail, or more steam

Translations

continue doing something, especially with more effort than before

• German: sich ranhalten, hinmachen (coll.), sich sputen (dated)

References

• “crack on”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.