Scrolling through silly or nonsensical social media posts can have an unofficial side effect: "brain rot." Why it matters: It's a phrase Oxford University Press said "gained new prominence in 2024" — so much so that Oxford dubbed the term its word of the year.

If you’ve been scrolling too long on social media, you might be suffering from “brain rot,” the word of 2024, per the publisher of the Oxford English Dictionary.After public consultation, Oxford University Press announced its choice—defined as the “supposed deterioration of a person’s mental or intellectual state,

After a long day, we’ve all been guilty of mindlessly scrolling through our social media feeds, sometimes for hours at a time. This phenomenon has been dubbed "brain rot", and Oxford University Press has chosen the term as its word of the year for 2024.

According to Oxford University Press, which publishes the Oxford English Dictionary (OED), the term ‘brain rot’ is defined as the “supposed deterioration

Capping off a year that proved, without a shadow of a doubt, that non- A.V. Club readers are spending too much time ingesting the worst shit imaginable online, the Oxford University Press has named “brain rot” Word of the Year.

Oxford University Press has named “brain rot” its word of the year. It's defined as “the supposed deterioration of a person’s mental or intellectual state,” especially from consuming too much low-grade online content.

Becoming a hot topic across the internet, the term ‘brain rot’ garnered over 37,000 votes to secure its place as Oxford Dictionary’s 2024 Word of the Year. The term describes the effect of spending too much time online and consuming low-quality,