官宣guān xuān

It’s official

guān xuān!官宣！It’s official!

官宣 is short for 官方宣布, “officially announce”. Online it means going public with news, above all with a new relationship.

Took off: 2018
Started in: A Weibo post
Today: Now everyday Chinese

What it means

The word copies 官网, “official website”, and 官微, “official Weibo account”. When a person uses it about their own news, it sounds like a press release, and that is the joke.

For couples, 官宣 means making the relationship public, usually with a photo on social media.

How people use it

官宣 is everyday Chinese now. People use it for a new partner, a new job, a new pet or a new product. Fans say 等官宣, “waiting for the official word”, about a rumor they hope is true.

里昂

你朋友圈那只猫是谁的？
nǐ péng you quān nà zhī māo shì shéi de?
Whose cat is that on your Moments?
我的！今天正式官宣
wǒ de! jīn tiān zhèng shì guān xuān
Mine! Making it official today.
叫什么名字？
jiào shén me míng zi?
What’s its name?
馒头
mán tou
Mantou. Like the steamed bun.
好可爱，下次带我去看它
hǎo kě ài, xià cì dài wǒ qù kàn tā
So cute. Take me to see it next time.

More examples

我们在一起了，正式官宣！
wǒ men zài yì qǐ le, zhèng shì guān xuān!
We’re together. It’s official!
新手机什么时候官宣？
xīn shǒu jī shén me shí hou guān xuān?
When will they announce the new phone?
他们俩还没官宣，但大家都知道了。
tā men liǎ hái méi guān xuān, dàn dà jiā dōu zhī dào le.
They haven’t gone public yet, but everyone knows.

Where it came from

On October 16, 2018, the actors Zhao Liying and Feng Shaofeng announced on Weibo that they were married. The post was a photo of the two with their marriage certificates and one word: 官宣.

It went up at 10:07 on Zhao Liying’s birthday, and the time matched Feng Shaofeng’s birthday, October 7. Weibo went down for a while under the traffic.

Within days, media, companies and ordinary users copied the one-word post for their own news. That December 咬文嚼字 put 官宣 on its list of the ten most popular phrases of 2018.

The original. The Weibo post: a photo of the couple with their marriage certificates, and the caption 官宣. National Business Daily reported it that day. National Business Daily (in Chinese)