脑腐 nǎo fǔ
What too much low-quality scrolling leaves behind.
The short answer
OnlineCurrent slangChecked November 2026
Naofu means brain rot: the mental mush that sets in after hours of low-effort scrolling. It names both sides of the habit — the videos are 脑腐内容, brain-rot content, and so, after enough of them, are you.
In a chat
- 里昂 Leon
我刷了三个小时短视频，现在什么都想不起来了。
I scrolled short videos for three hours, and now I can't remember a thing.
- 灯灯 Dengdeng
你这是脑腐了。
That's brain rot.
- 里昂 Leon
对，我得去看本书。
Right. I need to go read a book.
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How to reply
我也是，放下手机吧。
Same here. Let's put the phones down.
When not to use it
- It is a joke about yourself. If you tell someone else they have 脑腐, it is rude.
- The word is new. Some people will not know it, so be ready to explain.
What it means
Naofu is the fog that settles in during the third hour of short videos: you could not say what you watched, and you cannot fully explain why you kept watching. Chinese applies the word to both ends of the habit — the feed itself (脑腐内容, brain-rot content) and the viewer (我脑腐了, “my brain has rotted”).
The tone is the joke you make about yourself, not a diagnosis you hand to someone else. Say it with a sigh after a lost evening and it lands exactly right. It stays gentle by design; the older, harsher words in this family are a different story — see the usage notes.
How people use it
The common sentence shape attaches a cause: 短视频刷多了会脑腐, “scroll short videos too long and your brain rots”. The content side works the same way: 这种脑腐视频, “this kind of brain-rot video” — said with affection as often as contempt.
Do not confuse it with 脑残, a forum-era insult that calls a person brain-damaged. That one is genuinely hostile, and aiming it at people starts fights. Naofu rots your own brain gently; 脑残 insults someone else's. For the cozy end of the family, meet dianzi zhacai, the comfort videos you eat your meals with.
Where it comes from
English has the phrase from Henry David Thoreau, who wrote of “brain-rot” in Walden in 1854. The current wave started in December 2024, when Oxford University Press named “brain rot” its word of the year. 脑腐 is the close Chinese translation.
People use it mostly about themselves, after too much scrolling, and about the videos that cause it.
In use
2 examples昨晚刷短视频刷到两点，今天整个人脑腐了。
Last night I scrolled short videos until two — today my whole brain is mush.
少看点脑腐视频，睡前读几页书吧。
Watch fewer brain-rot videos — read a few pages before bed instead.
The characters
Explore individuallyIndividual character meanings do not always explain the meaning of the whole word.
Sources
This guide is original Dengdeng editorial content, offered under CC BY-SA 4.0. The linked dictionary entries adapt CC-CEDICT under the same license.