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Chinese Slang

Chinese Work & Burnout Slang

No corner of modern Chinese slang says more about how young people feel than the vocabulary of work and burnout. 内卷 (the rat race), 躺平 (lying flat), 摸鱼 (slacking on the clock), 摆烂 (letting it rot), and 打工人 (wage grunt) started online and became a whole way of describing life under pressure.

Haoshan Hong
Haoshan Hong

Founder of Fluentide · Native Mandarin speaker · Incoming Schwarzman Scholar at Tsinghua University

Updated July 2026

What is Chinese Work & Burnout Slang?

These words are genuinely useful — they carry cultural weight and reuse common characters, so learning them reinforces vocabulary you already need. Each entry gives the pinyin, the real English meaning, an example sentence, and the story behind it.

Chinese Work & Burnout Slang terms

活人微死 (huó rén wēi sǐ) — Physically present but emotionally flatlined — still at your desk, nobody home. A burnout joke, never literal.
Trending

活人微死

huó rén wēi sǐ

dead inside but still showing up

班味 (bān wèi) — 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.
Trending

班味

bān wèi

soul-crushed office look / work has drained me

外耗 (wài hào) — 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.
Trending

外耗

wài hào

making it someone else's problem

内卷 (nèi juǎn) — Pointless, exhausting competition where everyone works harder and harder just to stay in the same place — the rat race with no payoff.
Classic

内卷

nèi juǎn

the rat race / cutthroat grind

摸鱼 (mō yú) — Slacking off on the clock — looking busy while doing nothing. The daily resistance of the 打工人.
Classic

摸鱼

mō yú

to slack off / goof off at work

躺平 (tǎng píng) — Opting out of the grind — refusing to overwork, over-compete, or chase society's expectations. A quiet protest against 内卷.
Classic

躺平

tǎng píng

lying flat / quiet quitting, life edition

摆烂 (bǎi làn) — Deliberately letting things go to ruin — when a situation is already hopeless, you stop trying entirely. More nihilistic than 躺平.
Classic

摆烂

bǎi làn

letting it rot / actively giving up

打工人 (dǎ gōng rén) — A self-deprecating but oddly proud badge for the everyday wage earner grinding through their job.
Declining

打工人

dǎ gōng rén

wage slave / fellow worker bee

卷王 (juǎn wáng) — The overachiever who out-grinds everyone — staying latest, doing the most, dragging the bar up for the whole team. The champion of 内卷.
Declining

卷王

juǎn wáng

the try-hard / the grind champion

Browse other slang categories

Chinese Internet Slang

Pinyin acronyms, number codes, and meme words from Weibo, Bilibili, and Douyin — yyds, 666, xswl.

Chinese Gen-Z Slang

Cutesy, ironic, fast-changing words young people actually type — 绝绝子, 尊嘟假嘟, i人.

Everyday Chinese Slang

The casual expressions that fill normal conversation and make you sound less like a textbook.

Chinese Dating Slang

Labels for crushes, players, and relationship status — 海王, 舔狗, CPDD.

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