To sum up means in summary, so, all in all. These words start a brief recap of the main points at the end of an essay, an email or a meeting. The verb sum up itself means “to summarise”: sum up the discussion means to give a short summary of the discussion.
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To sum up, + summary; sum up + noun; sum it/them up
- To sum up, cities should make cycling safer rather than simply building more car parks.
- At the end of the meeting, our manager summed up the main decisions in five minutes.
- So, to sum up, we're meeting at nine, and everyone brings their own lunch.
What changed
First versionSummarising, remote work has more benefits than drawbacks for most office staff.
RevisionTo sum up, remote work has more benefits than drawbacks for most office staff.
It is tempting to use a single word here: Summarising. English speakers don't start a sentence this way; you need the fixed phrase To sum up. Only the first word was changed, and the rest of the sentence stayed the same.
A pronoun goes between sum and up: sum it up, sum them up. A noun can also come after up: sum up the results. In essays, To sum up and In conclusion are interchangeable, but To sum up sounds lighter and also works in conversation, for example at the end of a work meeting.
Your turn
The report is twenty pages long, but the director wants us to ___ in one sentence.
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sum it up — The pronoun it goes between sum and up: sum it up. Sum up it sounds wrong, because only a noun can come after up: sum up the report.
Write a short message to a work or study group chat after a meeting. Start with To sum up and list two things you agreed on.
To sum up, Anna will send the budget by Wednesday, and we'll meet again next Monday at ten.
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