Creepy, zany and demonstrably fake content is often called “slop.” The word's proliferation online, in part thanks to the widespread availability of generative artificial intelligence, landed it Merriam-Webster's 2025 word of the year.
“It’s such an illustrative word," said Greg Barlow, Merriam-Webster's president, in an exclusive interview with The Associated Press ahead of Monday’s announcement. “It’s part of a transformative technology, AI, and
it’s something that people have found fascinating, annoying and a little bit ridiculous.”
“Slop” was first used in the 1700s to mean soft mud, but it evolved more generally to mean something of little value. The definition has since expanded to mean "digital content of low quality that is produced usually in quantity by means of artificial intelligence."
In other words, “you know, absurd videos, weird advertising images, cheesy propaganda, fake news that looks real, junky AI-written digital books,” Barlow said.
AI video generators like Sora have wowed with their ability to quickly create realistic clips based merely on text prompts. But a flood of these images on social media, including clips depicting celebrities and deceased public figures, has raised worries about misinformation, deepfakes and copyright.
Such content has existed online for years, but the tools are more accessible now — and used to political ends by, among other figures, the head of the Pentagon. Last month, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth posted a manipulated image of a beloved cartoon turtle, reimagined as a grenade-wielding fighter, to defend U.S. military actions in Venezuela.
The Canadian animated show “Franklin” teaches preschoolers about kindness, empathy and inclusivity — but in Hegseth's hands, its 6-year-old main character became a tool to promote violence.
The word “slop” evokes unpleasant images of mud-caked pigs crowding around a dirty trough, or perhaps a bucket of steaming, fetid stew. Or AI amalgamations of algorithmic biases laden with offensive or nonsensical imagery.
For some, the word induces dread.
But to Barlow, it brings a sense of hope. The dictionary's president says the spike in searches for the word reflects that people have grown more aware of fake or shoddy content, and desire the inverse.
“They want things that are real, they want things that are genuine," he said. "It’s almost a defiant word when it comes to AI. When it comes to replacing human creativity, sometimes AI actually doesn’t seem so intelligent.”
To select the word of the year, the dictionary's editors review data about which words have risen in search results and usage. Then they come to a consensus about which word best reflects the span of the year.
“We like to think that we are a mirror for people," Barlow said.
Over the years, there are words that are consistently looked up, but they're filtered out as the dictionary's editors pick the one that best defines the year at hand.
“Words like ‘ubiquitous,’ ‘paradigm,’ ‘albeit,’ ‘irregardless,’ these are always top lookups because they’re words that are on the edge of our lexicon," Barlow said. “'Irregardless' is a word in the dictionary for one reason: It’s used. It’s been used for decades to mean ‘regardless.’”
The dictionary has selected one word every year since 2003 to capture and make sense of the current moment. Last year, shortly after the U.S. presidential election and amid the shifting national mood, Merriam-Webster chose the word “ polarization.”
A fresh edition came out last month that adds over 5,000 new words — a rare step that involves fully revising and reimagining one of its most popular dictionaries.
Rounding out Merriam-Webster’s top words of 2025:
The viral term exploded in popularity over the summer. It’s an inside joke with an unclear meaning, driven by social media. It can be traced back to rapper Skrilla’s 2024 song “Doot Doot (6 7).”
“It's self-referential," Barlow said. “It’s all the rage, but it’s not a defining term.”
The "performative male" is online shorthand for a disingenuous guy who pretends to like things women like in order to earn their trust. There's also a spate of influencers who've been called performative for posting surface-level “ kindness content.” The word is versatile, since it extends to stunts in national politics, grandstanding on social media and even the nature of the UN General Assembly.
There's a long national history of partisan gerrymandering in the U.S. To retain Republican control of Congress, President Donald Trump has urged maps to be redrawn before the 2026 midterm elections. That's led to GOP moves in Texas and Indiana to draw districts to their advantage, as well as a counter effort in Democrat-led California.
The definition of this popular internet phrase is “to participate in normal activities in the real world especially as opposed to online experiences and interactions.” It was a serious contender for Merriam-Webster's word of the year, since it's used to “describe the aspiration for many people to take a break from their digital addiction,” Barlow said.
A conclave is the centuries-old election of a pope that derives its name from the Italian “con clave” — meaning “with a key” — to underscore that cardinals are sequestered until they find a winner.
Some learned the meaning from the titular film in 2024. Others found out in real time when Pope Leo XIV became history’s first American pope in May 2025. “It was so event specific, but the spike (in searches) was huge," Barlow said.
Originally from Italian and Arabic for “free of charge,” the word entered English centuries ago. The definition is “a schedule of duties imposed by a government on imported or in some countries exported goods.”
Trump boasts that his tariffs protect American industries, lure factories to the U.S., raise money for the federal government and give him diplomatic leverage. But they've sparked a trade war and in reality account for less than 4% of federal revenue. The tariffs have also done little to dent the federal budget deficit — a staggering $1.8 trillion in fiscal 2025.
Yes, you read that correctly. “The name of this lake delighted and baffled us when it started clogging the Top Lookups list on Merriam-Webster.com,” the dictionary's editors said. In the Roblox game Spelling Bee!, the Massachusetts lake’s name can be encountered in special modes. But in New England? It's known as Webster Lake.
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1. 2024: polarization
2. 2023: authentic
3. 2022: gaslighting
4. 2021: vaccine
5. 2020: pandemic
6. 2019: they
7. 2018: justice
8. 2017: feminism
9. 2016: surreal
10. 2015: ism
