大冤种dà yuān zhǒng

Big sucker

wǒ zhēn shì gè dà yuān zhǒng.我真是个大冤种。I’m such a sucker.

大冤种 is a “big sucker”: the person who gets the short end, paying too much, doing the extra work or trusting the wrong person. Most often you say it about yourself.

Took off: 2022
Started in: Northeastern dialect
Today: Now everyday Chinese

What it means

冤 means “wronged” or “treated unfairly”, and 冤种 is the person who always gets the unfair end. The 大 in front makes it “big”. Common forms are 纯纯大冤种, “a total sucker”, and 职场大冤种, “the sucker at work”, who always ends up with the extra tasks.

The tone is warm. Calling yourself a 大冤种 turns a bad day into a funny story. Calling a friend one is half teasing, half “poor you”.

How people use it

It is now common across China. It fits paying full price the day before a sale, lending money you will not see again, or saying yes to a job nobody else wanted.

亮亮

你新买的耳机多少钱？
nǐ xīn mǎi de ěr jī duō shao qián?
How much were your new earbuds?
八百，昨天刚买的
bā bǎi, zuó tiān gāng mǎi de
800. I got them yesterday.
今天官网降价两百了
jīn tiān guān wǎng jiàng jià liǎng bǎi le
They’re 200 off on the official site today.
啊？那我纯纯大冤种了
á? nà wǒ chún chún dà yuān zhǒng le
What? So I’m a total sucker.
去问问能不能退差价
qù wèn wen néng bu néng tuì chā jià
Go ask if they’ll refund the difference.

More examples

我昨天刚买，今天就打折了，我真是个大冤种。
wǒ zuó tiān gāng mǎi, jīn tiān jiù dǎ zhé le, wǒ zhēn shì gè dà yuān zhǒng.
I bought it yesterday, and today it’s on sale. I’m such a sucker.
别人都下班了，就我还在加班，职场大冤种。
bié rén dōu xià bān le, jiù wǒ hái zài jiā bān, zhí chǎng dà yuān zhǒng.
Everyone else went home, and I’m still working. The office sucker.

Where it came from

冤种 comes from the dialect of China’s northeast, where it meant a person who sulks after being wronged. According to 语言文字周报, northeastern video creators first used it to make fun of themselves, and the rest of the internet took it up for anyone who did something foolish.

语言文字周报 put 冤种 third on its list of the ten most popular internet phrases of 2022 and said that 大冤种 had moved from dialect into standard Mandarin.

The original. There is no single image. The word spread through short videos by northeastern creators. The Paper reported the 2022 list and its notes on the word. The Paper (in Chinese)