Updated July 2026
What does 外耗 mean?
外耗 (wài hào) means making it someone else's problem in work Chinese slang. Letting it out instead of swallowing it. Where 内耗 is grinding yourself down with overthinking, 外耗 is directing that friction outward — saying the awkward thing, making it the other person's problem — to protect your own energy. Literally, it means "external expenditure".
Opposite / pairs with
Hear it explained
A 30-second take on 外耗 — what it means, where it came from, and how to use it.
Everyone knows 内耗 — internal friction, overthinking yourself into exhaustion. 外耗, wài hào, is the answer to it, and it points outward. The slogan is 与其内耗自己，不如外耗他人. Rather than grind yourself down, spend it on other people. Say the awkward thing. Make it their problem. Protect your own battery.
Example
与其内耗自己，不如外耗别人。
Yǔqí nèi hào zìjǐ, bùrú wài hào biérén.
Rather than grind yourself down, let it out on someone else.
Where 外耗 comes from
Coined against 内耗 — internal friction, the habit of overthinking yourself into exhaustion — and picked up as a 2025 buzzword. The slogan version is 与其内耗自己，不如外耗他人: rather than consume yourself, spend it on other people. Half joke, half a rule for not swallowing everything.
Related slang
Physically present but emotionally flatlined — still at your desk, nobody home. A burnout joke, never literal.
The worn-down, drained look a job stamps onto you — dead eyes, no spark, the 'office vibe' you can't wash off after months of clocking in.
Pointless, exhausting competition where everyone works harder and harder just to stay in the same place — the rat race with no payoff.
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