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I have found in the novel The ladykiller by Martina Cole the following:

'She looked 16 going on 25.'

What is the meaning of the phrase going on?
What part of speech is the phrase going on?

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  • Downvoted. Title does not make any sense, and it looks like you’re trying to make a comment about a different question. Please go make a comment on that question.
    – whiskeychief
    Jul 16, 2019 at 12:17

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From Merriam-Webster's definition of going:

going adjective

going on
: drawing near to : APPROACHING
// is six years old going on seven

So, going on is an adjectival phrase.

In the same way that the phrase is synonymous with the adjective approaching:

She is 16 and she is approaching 25.
She is 16 and she is going on 25.
She is 16 going on 25.

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  • The OED doesn't seem to touch this adjectival sense of "going on" and I'm not clear as to why they don't. Seems an omission.
    – WS2
    Jul 25, 2023 at 23:08
  • @WS2 are you looking at the latest version of the OED? I wouldn't be surprised to find that this sense arose after the first edition was published, and even after the first supplement. If it's missing from any of their output after 1959 then it is certainly an omission.
    – phoog
    Sep 5, 2023 at 8:43
  • It's in the current online OED but not easy to find: under go III.ii.47.1567– "intransitive. In the progressive. To approach a specified age, time, or point in time. Also with †in, †of, on, †upon. Originally and chiefly in going on ——:" I think there's a particular (often slightly creepy) nuance that the OED doesn't capture: precocity or sexual attractiveness beyond one's years, in the example.
    – Stuart F
    Sep 5, 2023 at 9:53
  • @StuartF I obviously missed that.
    – WS2
    Sep 5, 2023 at 22:25

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