Merriam-Webster, America’s oldest dictionary publisher, has added 1,400 new words, including glow-up, looksmaxxing, meme coin and trash panda – the affectionate nickname for raccoons. <\/p>\n
“The new entries reflect words and meanings that have demonstrated widespread use over time, offering a window into the world today,” the publisher said in a blog post.<\/p>\n
Other newly-added words are culinary-inspired, including superfood (foods rich in nutrients), bao (a stuffed bread bun popular in Asia), and cake pop (cake and icing on a lollipop stick).<\/p>\n
Ahead of autumn, cuffing season has also been added, referring to the time of year when single people seek a romantic partner with whom to spend the cold months.<\/p>\n
Some terms will already be familiar to many, such as whack-a-mole (“a situation in which a new problem appears as soon as an existing similar problem has been addressed”). <\/p>\n
Others may be less known, such as the Mandela effect (“the experience of many people collectively having the same false memory”).<\/p>\n
Some words are distinctly American, like the adjective California sober, which the dictionary defines as using marijuana and\/or alcohol while abstaining from other drugs, like cocaine or meth. <\/p>\n
Here are a few more of the newest additions:<\/p>\n
Rickroll – to prank someone into listening to Never Gonna Give You Up by English singer Rick Astley<\/p>\n
Uncanny valley – the creepy feeling from seeing something artificial that almost appears real<\/p>\n
parasocial – a one-sided emotional connection<\/p>\n
vibe coding – using an artificial intelligence system to generate computer code<\/p>\n
chili crisp – a spicy, crunchy condiment made from oil and fried bits peppers, garlic or shallots <\/p>\n
yacht rock – a genre of soft rock music that began in the 1970s<\/p>\n
neckbeard – a beard covering the chin and throat, as well as the “culture” associated with those beards, which sometimes can be a disparaging term as meaning misogynistic or a computer nerd<\/p>\n
shapewear – tight clothing that is designed to shape and smooth the body<\/p>\n
Sunday scaries – the feeling of anxiety or sadness knowing that the weekend is ending<\/p>\n
crashout – a dramatic ending, loss or defeat, or emotional breakdown<\/p>\n
Merriam-Webster is also expected to name its word of the year in the next few months.<\/p>\n
In 2025, the word slop was chosen, after its definition was expanded to include “digital content of low quality that is produced usually in quantity by means of artificial intelligence”.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Merriam-Webster, America’s oldest dictionary publisher, has added 1,400 new words, including glow-up, looksmaxxing, meme coin and trash panda…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":773074,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[90,56,54,55,4407],"class_list":["post-773073","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wildlife","tag-science","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom","tag-wildlife"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/773073","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=773073"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/773073\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/773074"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=773073"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=773073"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=773073"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}