It’s been a year of “deliberate agitation.” Witness Oxford University Press’ announcement that rage bait was Word of the Year.
Compare with last year’s word brain rot: “outrage sparks engagement, algorithms amplify it, and constant exposure leaves us mentally exhausted.”
Eliciting anger grabs attention, offers personal gain, promotes political sway – all in a marketplace of bad faith, manipulative tactics, emotional hijacking. Yeah, words have consequences.
Which elicits the broader question: Is this who we truly are? Is the type of society we want? Is this venal drift sustainable?
• Oxford University Press > The Oxford Word of the Year 2025 is rage bait (December 1, 2025) – The word has tripled in usage in the last 12 months
The Oxford Word of the Year can be a singular word or expression, which our lexicographers think of as a single unit of meaning.
Our language experts shortlisted three contenders – rage bait, aura farming, and biohack – that reflect our conversations and preoccupations over the past year. After three days of voting in which more than 30,000 people had their say, our experts chose rage bait after considering votes, the sentiment of public commentary, and their analysis of our lexical data.
Why rage bait?
Rage bait is defined as “online content deliberately designed to elicit anger or outrage by being frustrating, provocative, or offensive, typically posted in order to increase traffic to or engagement with a particular web page or social media content”.
With 2025’s news cycle dominated by social unrest, debates about the regulation of online content, and concerns over digital wellbeing, our experts noticed that the use of rage bait this year has evolved to signal a deeper shift in how we talk about attention – both how it is given and how it is sought after – engagement, and ethics online. The word has tripled in usage in the last 12 months.
Related terms
- Clickbait
- Resonance
- Influencer
- Troll
- Edgelord
- False consensus effect
- Pluralistic ignorance
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- ‘Brain rot’ – word of the year 2024
- Authentic – word of the year 2023
- Gaslighting – word of the year 2022
