If You Know What ‘Brainrot’ Means, You Might Already Have It
A popular term captures the condition of being terminally online, with humor and pathos.
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Jessica Roy is a writer based in Paris, where she moved at least in part to avoid brainrot after decades spent working in digital media.
If you or someone you love speaks almost exclusively in internet references — “It’s giving golden retriever boyfriend energy” or “Show it to me Rachel” — they may be suffering from a condition known as “brainrot.”
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The term refers primarily to low-value internet content and the effects caused by spending too much time consuming it. Example: “I’ve been watching so many TikToks, I have brainrot.”
Online discussion of brainrot has recently grown so widespread that some social media users have begun creating parodies of people who seem to embody the condition.
Several videos by the TikTok user Heidi Becker show her facing the camera as she strings together one internet reference after another in rapid-fire fashion.
“Hiii, oh my god, the fit is fitting, pop off king!” she says at the start of a recent video that has over 200,000 likes.
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