weird flex but OK

“Weird flex but OK” is a reply to someone bragging about something strange, embarrassing or not actually impressive. It means “that’s an odd thing to show off, but sure.”

What weird flex but OK means

A flex is a boast. A weird flex is a boast that backfires: bragging that you’ve never read a book, that you haven’t washed your car in a decade, or that you survive on four hours of sleep. Know Your Meme describes it as a way to answer a boast that sounds more negative than positive. The “but OK” is the shrug.

It’s usually teasing rather than cruel, and people often use it about themselves: “I’ve watched this movie 47 times. Weird flex, I know.”

Examples

• “I’ve never once eaten a vegetable.” “Weird flex but OK.”
• “He told everyone he got kicked out of three bars in one night. Weird flex.”
• “My phone has 14,000 unread emails. Weird flex but OK.”

Where it came from

Know Your Meme traces the earliest known use to a tweet on December 31, 2017, replying to a post by Malala Yousafzai. It spread through 2018, and one reply that September, under a tweet comparing what someone spent on gummies with what others spend on gas, picked up hundreds of thousands of likes. Later that month the phrase was widely used in reaction to a TV interview in which Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh described his high school years. The variant “odd flex but OK” means the same thing.

Related terms

• Flex: to show off.
• This ain’t it: this isn’t good.
• Cringe: embarrassing.
• L: a loss.

See more terms like this in our Gen Z slang guide.