怼duì

To snap back at someone

duì huí qu!怼回去！Hit back!

怼 means to snap back at someone: to answer criticism with a sharp, direct reply, or to go after someone in words. 怼人 is to tell someone off, and 被怼 is to get told off.

Took off: 2017
Started in: Dialect speech
Today: Now everyday Chinese

What it means

The old meaning of 怼 is “to resent”, and few people had seen the character. The meme meaning is about action, not feeling. 怼 is fast and blunt, and it is often a reply: someone criticizes you, and you 怼 them back.

In games it can mean attacking an enemy head-on, and it can also mean one car hitting another, Sixth Tone notes.

How people use it

怼 is ordinary Chinese now, and much stronger than 反驳, “to rebut”. 怼得好 is praise for a good comeback. Between friends, 别怼我 means “stop picking on me”.

琦琦

今天开会怎么样？
jīn tiān kāi huì zěn me yàng?
How did the meeting go today?
我才说了一句，就被经理怼了
wǒ cái shuō le yí jù, jiù bèi jīng lǐ duì le
I’d barely said a word when the manager shut me down.
你没怼回去？
nǐ méi duì huí qu?
You didn’t fire back?
不敢，我还想要这份工作
bù gǎn, wǒ hái xiǎng yào zhè fèn gōng zuò
I didn’t dare. I still want this job.

More examples

我被老板怼了一顿。
wǒ bèi lǎo bǎn duì le yí dùn.
My boss chewed me out.
她怼人从来不留情面。
tā duì rén cóng lái bù liú qíng miàn.
When she snaps at someone, she never holds back.
他一句话就把对方怼回去了。
tā yí jù huà jiù bǎ duì fāng duì huí qu le.
He shut the other person down with one sentence.

Where it came from

怼 comes from dialect speech. In Henan dialect it is said duǐ and means “to deal with someone” or “to bump into”, The Paper explains. Online, people write it 怼 and say it duì.

The Paper traces the spread to a TV reality show, where a guest who had just been scolded asked whether that was 被怼. In December 2017, 咬文嚼字 put 怼 on its list of the ten most popular phrases of the year, and the national language monitoring center put it on its list of internet words.