Gen Alpha slang is the vocabulary of kids born from the early 2010s on: the ones yelling “six seven” in class, calling their dad “unc” and rating each other in aura points. Some of it is borrowed from older siblings, a lot comes from streamers, and a surprising amount is nonsense on purpose. This guide explains what the words mean, which ones are harmless and which ones are worth a conversation, with a full entry for each.

Nonsense words (that’s the point)

Plenty of Gen Alpha slang doesn’t really mean anything. Kids like having words adults can’t decode, so “but what does it mean?” is half the joke.

• Six seven (67): a catchphrase shouted whenever those two numbers come up. Dictionary.com’s 2025 Word of the Year.
• Skibidi: a nonsense word from the YouTube series Skibidi Toilet.
• Ohio: weird or cringe, from the “only in Ohio” memes.
• Goofy ahh: silly or ridiculous.
• Chat, is this real?: “can you believe this?”, borrowed from streamers.
• Brain rot: endless low-effort content, and what it does to your brain.

Coolness, status and looks

• Rizz: charm, especially when flirting.
• Aura: coolness points. You can gain aura or lose it.
• Aura farming: doing something to look effortlessly cool.
• Sigma: the lone-wolf type, or just “cool,” usually ironic.
• Mog: to outshine someone, especially in looks.
• Looksmaxxing: trying to make yourself as attractive as possible.
• Mewing: a jawline trick that turned into a silent meme gesture.
• W and L: a win and a loss.
• NPC: someone who acts like a background video game character.

Teasing and insults

• Chopped: ugly.
• Big back: a big body, usually someone who loves food.
• Unc: an older guy, or anyone acting old.
• Clanker: a mocking word for robots and AI.
• Mid: average, nothing special.
• Glazing: over-the-top praise.
• Cringe: embarrassing.
• Sus: suspicious.
• Cap: a lie.

Borrowed from streamers and Gen Z

Gen Alpha grew up watching streamers, so a lot of their slang comes straight out of Twitch and YouTube chats. Other words are hand-me-downs from older siblings and cousins.

• Fanum tax: stealing a bite of a friend’s food, named after the streamer Fanum.
• Gyatt: an exclamation at a curvy body (see the note below).
• Jit: a kid, or a rookie.
• Crash out: losing your temper completely.
• No cap: for real.
• Bussin: really good, especially food.
• Delulu: delusional.
• FR: for real.
• Bet: OK, deal.
• Bruh: the reaction to something dumb.

Words worth a conversation

Most of this is harmless. A few words are cruder or meaner than kids sometimes realize:

• Gyatt started as a stretched-out “goddamn” at someone’s body. Kids often use it about everything, but said about a real person it’s objectifying.
• Huzz is a reworking of “hoes.” Even when it’s a joke, it has a crude edge.
• Goofy ahh is mild, but “ahh” does stand for “ass.”
• Big back, chopped and mog can be used to rank and body-shame classmates.
• Looksmaxxing and mewing come out of online communities obsessed with appearance, and some of the advice in them is extreme.

Banning a word rarely works, and it can make it more appealing. Asking what it means, and how it would feel if someone said it about you, tends to get further.

How Gen Alpha slang differs from Gen Z slang

There’s a lot of overlap. Words like rizz, slay and no cap were already everywhere when Gen Alpha kids got their first phones, and they kept them. What feels more Gen Alpha is the style: stacking meme words into nonsense (“skibidi Ohio rizz”), turning numbers into jokes, talking to an imaginary audience as “chat,” and scoring everything in aura points.

It also moves fast. Gen Alpha is generally described as the first generation that has never known a world without smartphones and social media, so a phrase can go from one streamer’s clip to every classroom in a few weeks, and be considered cringe a few months later. When adults start using a word, that’s often the sign it’s on its way out.

For more, see our Gen Z slang dictionary, the TikTok slang guide, gaming slang, or the full A–Z index.