UP IN THE AIR

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does up in the air mean? 

• UP IN THE AIR (adjective)
  The adjective UP IN THE AIR has 2 senses:

1. very uncertain

2. not yet determined

  Familiarity information: UP IN THE AIR used as an adjective is rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• UP IN THE AIR (adjective)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Very uncertain

Context example:

left everything up in the air

Similar:

uncertain (not established beyond doubt; still undecided or unknown)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Not yet determined

Context example:

plans are still up in the air

Similar:

uncertain (not certain to occur; not inevitable)

 Context examples 

But he threw quilts and pillows up in the air, got out and said: “Now anyone who likes, may drive,” and lay down by his fire, and slept till it was day.

(Fairy Tales, by The Brothers Grimm)

He tried desperately to say something else, and he held his right hand up in the air.

(The Return of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

That Mrs. Steerforth might not be induced to look behind her, and read, plainly written, what she was not yet prepared to know, I met her look quickly; but I had seen Rosa Dartle throw her hands up in the air with vehemence of despair and horror, and then clasp them on her face.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

And even he could not repress a start and an involuntary bristling of hair along his back when she suddenly leaped, without warning, straight up in the air, at the same time emitting a long and most terrible squall.

(White Fang, by Jack London)

There was a sudden swirl in the crowd, a rush, a shout, and high up in the air there spun an old black hat, floating over the heads of the ring-siders and flickering down within the ropes.

(Rodney Stone, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

In hopes to ingratiate myself further into his majesty’s favour, I told him of an invention, discovered between three and four hundred years ago, to make a certain powder, into a heap of which, the smallest spark of fire falling, would kindle the whole in a moment, although it were as big as a mountain, and make it all fly up in the air together, with a noise and agitation greater than thunder.

(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)

Those who were looking on heard what was neither bark nor yelp, but a something which is best described as a roar, and they saw Buck’s body rise up in the air as he left the floor for Burton’s throat.

(The Call of the Wild, by Jack London)

He bore over his shoulder a great knotted stick with three jagged nails stuck in the head of it, and from time to time he whirled it up in the air with a quivering arm, as though he could scarce hold back from dashing his companion's brains out.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

“She was never well,” said Peggotty, “for a long time. She was uncertain in her mind, and not happy. When her baby was born, I thought at first she would get better, but she was more delicate, and sunk a little every day. She used to like to sit alone before her baby came, and then she cried; but afterwards she used to sing to it—so soft, that I once thought, when I heard her, it was like a voice up in the air, that was rising away.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)