Look Up or Look Into? How to Pick the Right “Look” Phrase on a Busy Saturday

On Friday night a friend sends you this message. Your reply is the one on the second line.

Maya: Can you look after Milo on Saturday afternoon? I’m busy until six.

You: Of course! I’ll look up the park’s opening hours. I’m looking forward to taking him out. Oh, the park page says the north entrance is closed. I’ll look into it.

(The message is written for this page; Milo, the park and the closed north entrance come from Paul and Emily’s episode.)

That is four phrases in four sentences, and every one of them begins with look. Each does a different job. One finds a fact, one takes responsibility for a dog, one starts to investigate a problem, and one says you are pleased about what is coming. Swap any two and the message goes wrong: nobody wants the opening hours looked after, and Milo does not need to be looked up.

In the episode, Emily makes that exact swap in front of Paul. “I need to look after the opening hours,” she says, and Paul points out that opening hours do not need care. This lesson walks through her Saturday, one phrase at a time, so you can hear why each one fits.

Saturday morning: look up the park hours

Look up means finding a specific piece of information in a source: a website, a message, a dictionary, a schedule, a list or a map. In the episode the examples are a word, an address, a train time, a phone number and the opening hours.

What these have in common is that the answer is small and exists somewhere already. You are not solving anything; you are fetching it. If you can picture the answer as a single time, a single number or a single word, look up is probably the phrase.

A pronoun goes in the middle: I’ll look it up, not I’ll look up it. Emily’s example is a good one to borrow: “I don’t remember the park address, but I can look it up.” With a noun you have two options, look up the address or look the address up, and both work.

Saturday afternoon: look after Milo

Look after means taking care of someone or something, or being responsible for them. Despite the verb, it has nothing to do with using your eyes.

The things you can look after are wider than people think. In the episode, someone can look after a bag for a minute, a grandfather on Sundays or a shop in the afternoon. The common idea is care or responsibility.

There is one neighbour that causes real confusion, and that is look for. If you say, “I’m looking for Milo,” you are trying to find him: he has slipped out of the garden and you do not know where he is. If you say, “I’m looking after Milo,” you know exactly where he is, because he is asleep on your sofa and he is your responsibility. One small word can change the whole afternoon.

The closed entrance: look into the problem

Back at the park website, there is a notice: “North entrance closed Saturday.”

Emily’s first thought is to say, “I’ll look up the closure.” That works if you mean you will search for one specific notice or piece of information. But if your real questions are “Why is it closed?” and “Which entrance should we use instead?” you are no longer retrieving one fact. You are examining a situation, and that is the job of look into: you investigate, check more carefully or try to understand what is happening.

Paul’s contrast is worth keeping. Look up tends to have a fairly clear target: What time does it open? What is the address? How do you spell this word? Look into tends to start with a problem, a question, a complaint, an unusual situation or something that needs more checking. If your train is late, you can look up the new departure time. If it keeps disappearing from the board and no one knows why, someone needs to look into the problem.

Unlike look up, look into keeps its two words together even with a pronoun: look into it, never look it into. The same goes for look after it.

The hosts are honest that this is not a perfect rule for every possible sentence. It is, in their words, a very useful communication distinction, and it will get you through most of the situations you meet.

The two phrases often follow each other. In the training-day role-play, Emily checks a visitor’s name and says, “I’ll look it up.” When the name is not there, she says, “I can’t find the record, so I’m going to look into what happened.” The search comes first; the investigation begins when the search is not enough.

Setting off: look forward to taking Milo out

Look forward to is the fourth job, and it is the only one about feelings. It says you feel pleased or positive about something in the future.

The trap is that little word to. We say “I want to take Milo,” but “I’m looking forward to taking Milo.” In look forward to, the to belongs to the expression, so when a verb follows, it normally takes -ing. A noun works too, as in “I’m looking forward to Saturday.”

Three more from the episode, all with -ing: “I’m looking forward to seeing you.” “I’m looking forward to trying the new cafe.” “I’m looking forward to having a quiet evening.”

A four-step check at the park gate

When all four phrases look alike on the page, work down these steps. Stop at the first yes.

1. Are you pleased about something coming up? Use look forward to, followed by a noun or an -ing verb.
2. Does someone or something depend on you? Use look after. You know where it is and it is your job to keep it safe.
3. Is there one clear thing to find in a source? A time, a number, a word, an address: use look up.
4. Is something unclear, odd or unexplained, and a search will not fix it? Use look into.

If two seem to fit, ask what the answer will look like. A fact is look up. A cause is look into.

Five Saturday sentences, repaired

The first three come from the episode’s repair section; the other two come from its opening and its pronoun point.

First version	Repair	Why it needed repairing
I need to look after the opening hours.	I need to look up the opening hours.	The hours are information, not something that needs care.
Can you look up my dog this afternoon?	Can you look after my dog this afternoon?	You mean care. Look up makes the listener expect information.
I’ll look after the problem and tell you what happened.	I’ll look into the problem and tell you what happened.	You mean investigate it, so look into is clearer.
I’m looking forward to meet the new teacher.	I’m looking forward to meeting the new teacher.	To is part of the phrase, so the verb takes -ing.
I’ll look up it.	I’ll look it up.	The pronoun goes in the middle.

Notice that all five mistakes have the same cause. The speaker chose by the word, not by the job.

Ten situations, ten phrases

Written for this page, except where the episode’s own situation is noted. Choose the phrase for each one, then check the answers.

1. You need the phone number for a restaurant. (from the episode)
2. Your neighbour asks you to feed her cat for the evening. (from the episode)
3. A club keeps charging you the wrong amount and nobody knows why. (from the episode)
4. Your cousin is visiting next week and you are excited to see her. Finish: “I’m looking forward to ___.” (from the episode)
5. A message uses the word drizzle and you do not know it.
6. A colleague goes to lunch and asks you to watch her desk for an hour.
7. A parcel is marked “delivered,” but it is not at your door.
8. Which is right: “I’m looking forward to hear from you” or “I’m looking forward to hearing from you”?
9. You search the booking system for one person’s name and cannot find it. What do you say next? (from the episode)
10. You say, “I’m looking after my cat,” but you mean the cat has run away. What went wrong?

Answers

1. Look it up. One specific piece of information.
2. Look after the cat. You are responsible for it.
3. Look into it. There is a problem that needs investigation.
4. “I’m looking forward to seeing her.”
5. Look it up: one word, found in a dictionary or on a website.
6. Look after her desk. The desk is your responsibility for an hour.
7. Look into it, for example, by contacting the delivery service. Nobody knows why it says “delivered,” so a search for one fact is not enough.
8. “I’m looking forward to hearing from you.” The to belongs to the phrase.
9. “I looked it up, but I couldn’t find the record, so I’ll look into what happened.”
10. You wanted look for. “I’m looking for my cat” means you are trying to find him. “Looking after” means you already know where he is.

A reception desk, read aloud

Adapted from the training-day role-play in the episode, shortened for this page. Read both parts, then swap.

A: I can’t remember the room number for the afternoon session. Can you check the booking?

B: Sure. I’ll look it up.

A: Thanks. I also need to speak to the building manager. Could you stay at reception while I’m gone?

B: Of course. I’ll look after the desk.

A: One more thing. Two names are missing from the visitor list, and I don’t know whether they registered late or whether the list is incomplete.

B: Okay, I’ll look into it.

A: You sound calm. Are you actually enjoying this?

B: I am. I’m looking forward to meeting the new trainer.

Pick out four lines: one for each job. In the episode the next scene starts with a visitor who says, “I registered yesterday, but my name isn’t here.” Look it up first, and if the name is still missing, look into what happened.

Questions about look up and look into

Can I say “look up the closure”?
Yes, if you mean you will search for a specific notice. If you want to know why something is closed and what to do instead, look into describes the job better.

Can I look after things as well as people?
Yes. The episode’s examples are a bag, a shop and a grandfather, and animals and places work too. The idea is care or responsibility, not the kind of object.

Do I always need -ing after “look forward to”?
If a verb follows, yes. A noun also works: “I’m looking forward to Saturday.”

Are there simpler words for these phrases?
Yes. Check, search, care for, investigate and be excited about are all useful. The hosts say they practise these four phrases because they are common and compact, not because they are always the only natural choice.

Your own Saturday in four sentences

Think of one real plan you have this week. It can be a visit, a class, a pet-sitting afternoon or a workday. Say or write four connected sentences about it, one for each job:

1. Something you will look up: a time, an address, a word, a number, a rule or a schedule.
2. Someone or something you will look after.
3. A question or problem you will look into.
4. Something you are looking forward to, with a noun or an -ing verb.

A model, written for this page: I’m going to my sister’s on Sunday. I’ll look up the train times tonight, and I’m looking after her dog while she cooks. There is a problem with her old oven, so I’ll look into it before we start. I’m looking forward to eating together.

If you want to try again, make the second version clearer, not longer. Check four things: look it up with the pronoun in the middle, look after for care or responsibility, look into for a real question or problem, and a noun or an -ing form after look forward to.

The four jobs on one card

Phrase	The job	Pattern	Model sentence
look up	find one specific fact	look it up	I’ll look up the opening hours.
look after	take care of someone or something	look after him / it	I’m looking after Milo on Saturday.
look into	investigate a question or problem	look into it	I’ll look into why the north entrance is closed.
look forward to	feel pleased about something ahead	+ noun or + -ing	I’m looking forward to taking him there.

The word look stays the same on every row. Only the job changes, so decide the job first and the phrase follows.

Hear it in a real conversation

To hear Paul and Emily work through the park, the museum and the training day, open the show note: Look Up, Look After, Look Into and Look Forward To: Listen for the Job, Not the Word. It has the video, the chapters, a practice section and the full transcript. If you enjoyed choosing between phrasal verbs by situation, try Bring Up vs Bring Out (and Bring In, Bring Back): Which One Do You Mean?, and for the rule behind look it up, look into it and look after it, see Turn It On or Turn On It? Where the Pronoun Goes in Phrasal Verbs.