吃鸡chī jī

Eat chicken (win the game)

dà jí dà lì, jīn wǎn chī jī!大吉大利，今晚吃鸡！Winner winner, chicken dinner!

吃鸡 means “eat chicken”. To Chinese players it means winning a round of PUBG, the shooting game in which the last player alive wins, and it is also the nickname of the game itself.

Took off: 2017
Started in: PUBG
Today: Now everyday Chinese

What it means

The full line is 大吉大利，今晚吃鸡, “great luck and great fortune, chicken for dinner tonight”. It is the Chinese version of the line PUBG shows when you win: “Winner winner, chicken dinner!”

Soon 吃鸡 also meant playing the game at all. 今晚一起吃鸡吗? is an invitation to play together tonight, not to dinner.

How people use it

吃鸡 is everyday gamer Chinese, and people who never play know it too. Restaurants have used the slogan to sell chicken, according to The World of Chinese.

亮亮

今晚八点吃鸡吗？
jīn wǎn bā diǎn chī jī ma?
Want to play PUBG at eight tonight?
好啊，我上次差一点就吃鸡了
hǎo a, wǒ shàng cì chà yì diǎn jiù chī jī le
Sure. Last time I almost won.
这次带你吃鸡！
zhè cì dài nǐ chī jī!
This time I’ll carry you to the win!
[Sticker] the 'winner winner, chicken dinner' victory banner
先说好，我只负责捡东西
xiān shuō hǎo, wǒ zhǐ fù zé jiǎn dōng xi
Fair warning: I’m only there to loot.

More examples

今晚一起吃鸡吗？
jīn wǎn yì qǐ chī jī ma?
Want to play a round together tonight?
我玩了一晚上，终于吃鸡了！
wǒ wán le yì wǎn shang, zhōng yú chī jī le!
I played all night and finally won!

Where it came from

PUBG (PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds) came out on Steam in 2017 and spread fast in China.

The English line is older. It comes from casino talk and is best known from the film 21, as ifanr and The Paper both note. ifanr quotes the game’s early Chinese text as 大吉大利，晚上吃鸡, with 晚上, “in the evening”. The version people repeat says 今晚, “tonight”.

The PUBG end-of-match banner in yellow Chinese text, 大吉大利，晚上吃鸡！, above the line: team rank 1, 2 kills, reward 454 — The original meme image. Crop of a PUBG early-access victory screen in Chinese (game by PUBG Corporation); screenshot via Moegirlpedia. Source

Sources

ifanr on the PUBG line, July 2017 (in Chinese) (ifanr.com)
The Paper on PUBG in China, December 2017 (in Chinese) (m.thepaper.cn)
The World of Chinese: Chinese gamer slang, November 2022 (theworldofchinese.com)

Checked November 2026. The picture at the top is our own drawing of 灯灯. The original meme image belongs to its owner and is shown to explain the meme. To ask us to remove it, write to legal@dengdeng.app.