diff --git a/src/transformers/models/phi3/modeling_phi3.py b/src/transformers/models/phi3/modeling_phi3.py
index 9e41e38eb1..5a77252cf4 100644
--- a/src/transformers/models/phi3/modeling_phi3.py
+++ b/src/transformers/models/phi3/modeling_phi3.py
@@ -242,12 +242,12 @@ class Phi3MLP(nn.Module):
         self.activation_fn = ACT2FN[config.hidden_act]
 
     def forward(self, hidden_states: torch.FloatTensor) -> torch.FloatTensor:
-        y = self.gate_up_proj(hidden_states)
+        up_states = self.gate_up_proj(hidden_states)
 
-        gate, y = y.chunk(2, dim=-1)
-        y = y * self.activation_fn(gate)
+        gate, up_states = up_states.chunk(2, dim=-1)
+        up_states = up_states * self.activation_fn(gate)
 
-        return self.down_proj(y)
+        return self.down_proj(up_states)
 
 
 # Copied from transformers.models.llama.modeling_llama.repeat_kv with llama->phi