1. Make a mess of or create disorder in
   "He messed up his room";
   - mess
    
2. Badly mishandle or ruin something
   "I messed up the dinner and we had to eat out";
   - botch, bodge [Brit, informal], bumble, fumble, botch up [informal], muff [informal], blow [informal], flub [N. Amer, informal], screw up [informal], spoil, muck up [informal], bungle, fluff [informal], bobble [N. Amer], mishandle, louse up [informal], foul up [informal], butcher, balls up [informal], cock up [Brit, informal], goof up [informal], make a hash of [informal]
    
3. Disturb the smoothness of
   "mess up the surface of the water";
   - ruffle, ruffle up, rumple

1. Something badly botched or muddled
   "The presentation turned into a complete mess-up";
   - cockup [Brit, informal], botch-up [Brit, informal], stuff-up [Austral, NZ, informal]

Derived forms: messed up, messes up, messing up, mess-ups

Type of: disarrange, disarray, disorder, error, fail, fault, go wrong, miscarry, mistake