Poll
Meme Of The Year: The Top 20 Memes Of 2025
Well, meme lovers, here we are. Against all odds, we've made it to the end of another year, and what a year it's been, especially in the world of memes and internet culture.
While 2025 might not have been the easiest or most hopeful year for a lot of people, it has done a lot to prove the old adage that hard times make strong memes.
This year, it felt like we were met with a constant barrage of memes that were harder than ever to keep up with, thanks to the rise and advancement of AI, the fast growth of short-form content, the increasing acceptance of brainrot and other notable influences on meme culture.
Between all the political turmoil, tragedies and little annoyances of the year, there was always a new meme or two to make everything a little more manageable, and now is the time for us to celebrate those memes that helped us laugh and smile through it all.
Here are the top 20 memes of 2025, as voted by you, our beloved Know Your Meme users and most cherished meme lovers. Thank you for voting and thank you for memeing. See you in 2026!
Honorable Mentions
Before we bust into the top 20 memes of the year, here are some honorable mentions that didn't quite make it onto the list, but still hold a special place in our hearts and only just came up short.
This year, the "Meet Potential Man" meme reached its full potential on Reddit, the white rabbit reminded us that time is running out, the "Ok Garmin" video became the soundtrack to all kinds of road accidents and the Eye of Rah brought brainrot to a new dimension.
Meanwhile, "Cassius Thundercock" became the face of police brutality, we learned a neat fact about buying a property in Egypt, the "Cooked Dog" warmed our souls, and we discovered that everything rhymes with Grug.
These memes may not have cracked the top 20, but they were all funny and memorable in their own right, earning them a shoutout and honorable mention.
Now, onto the main event to see which was crowned "Meme of the Year."
20. Aura Farming (1.4% of Votes)
Aura has become one of the hottest commodities on the internet over the last two years, so it's only natural that aura farming was one of the biggest trends of 2025.
Aura farming is all about looking as cool as possible in any given situation, and in 2025, people were doing their best Piccolo impressions and aura farming all over social media. Some people use the term ironically, some use it genuinely, and some people aura farm without even knowing they're doing it.
Now, we just need to answer the question, "Where is the line between aura farming and cringe farming?" Maybe 2026 holds the answer.
19. Japanese Salarywoman Saori Araki (1.5% of Votes)
In July, the internet fell in love with the "Japanese Salarywoman," Saori Araki, after a simple photo of her holding a folder and making a face went viral on X / Twitter and spread across social media.
This one photograph changed the landscape on Twitter for weeks, inspiring countless memes and reactions that leaked all across the internet.
Saori herself ultimately leaned into the virality hard, releasing a song and using the attention to further her aspirations of becoming an idol (learn more about this in our interview with her here).
18. Clanker (1.6% of Votes)
The fast rise of artificial intelligence has hit us all really hard this year, so, naturally, we've taken a slur from Star Wars to remind those filthy clankers of their place.
Memes about clankers have been prevalent in online Star Wars communities for many years, but this year the term evolved into a full-on insult towards everything from delivery robots to AIs. Along with "clanker" came a whole list of additional robot-related slurs, some of which sound so close to real slurs that it makes us nervous to even repeat them.
It's debatable whether or not popularizing a slur for a quickly rising form of intelligence is a good idea or not, but what's not debatable is how funny the memes are.
17. Totr (1.8% of Votes)
Brainrot was the biggest vibe in short-form content in 2025, and the "Totr" meme stood above many other examples as a bizarrely endearing trend.
On the surface, Totr is a pretty basic brainrot edit meme, but there's one thing that made it stick out enough to earn the 17th spot in the meme of the year list: SpongeBob. Unless he comes in the form of actor and singer Ethan Slater, everybody loves SpongeBob!
Of course, Totr was only one of many brainrot memes of 2025, so look forward to more coming up in this list.
16. The Great Meme Reset of 2026 (1.9% of Votes)
The so-called "Great Meme Reset of 2026" hasn't even happened yet, but if you need a sign that it's going to be big, let its inclusion on this list be that sign.
The idea is that, in 2026, old memes like "Big Chungus" and "Ugandan Knuckles" are going to come back in a big way. It sounds kind of forced, but forcing memes has been an increasingly popular and successful tactic in recent years, especially this year thanks to NicheTok, so don't be surprised if your feeds get overflown with 2010s meme nostalgia in the coming weeks.
If successful, maybe we can save some time repurposing our "2016 Meme of the Year" article for 2026.
15. My Mom Is Kinda Homeless (2.3% of Votes)
Streamer and content creator iShowSpeed has become a major figure in memes over the past few years, and one notable 2021 stream is still giving us juice years later.
This year, the notable quote "My mom is kinda homeless," along with Speed's hilarious don't-laugh face, went viral enough to make the number 15 spot on our list, marking an impressive feat for a meme based on a four-year-old livestream.
It also helped that this year, Speed reunited with the people who made this quote and stream so memorable in the first place for a viral recreation of the now-iconic event.
If we have one guarantee going into 2026, it's that iShowSpeed will become the subject of at least a few big memes, so keep an eye out.
14. Frieren Looking Up (2.5% of Votes)
The art world came together in November when a humble artist shared a beautifully bad drawing of the anime character Frieren looking up that served as not only a learning moment, but one of the year's biggest memes.
The problem with the art was the jaw, and you only have to take one look at the drawing to realize that. It's a tough angle to get right for any amateur artist, and the poster needed help.
This resulted in not only a lot of genuine advice and defense for the artist, but a mountain of redraws and memes paying homage to the original, flat-jawed drawing, only with different characters in place of Frieren.
Now, the artist has a genuine fanbase, their art has become the icon for the /r/Frieren subreddit, and, finally, the "Bad Sasuke Drawing" has found a partner. Some memes really do have happy endings.
13. We Are Charlie Kirk (2.5% of Votes)
People like to pretend that they hate AI music, but then a song like "We Are Charlie Kirk" by Spalexma comes around, and suddenly, they can't seem to get enough.
In November, this atrociously addicting tribute to the late Charlie Kirk gave the internet one more way to meme on the conservative political commentator shortly after his highly publicized assassination.
Some people got genuine joy out of it, but everyone else claimed that they only liked it ironically (whatever helps you sleep at night). Either way, the song was huge and remains so in a lot of online circles.
This, of course, is only one of the various Charlie Kirk-related memes that dominated the latter half of 2025, so don't be surprised if you see another one later on in this list.
12. Hasan Dog Shock Collar Memes (2.8% of Votes)
In October, the streaming world was shocked like a disobedient dog when a clip that allegedly showed leftist Twitch streamer Hasan Piker shocking his dog during a stream after she stepped off her bed went viral.
This clip spread very fast and arguably became the biggest controversy of Piker's career, which is surprising considering that this is the man who once famously said that America deserved 9/11. Regardless, the event inspired not only a lot of internet sleuthing, theories, tangled stories and confusing justifications, but a wide variety of memes that were inescapable on X / Twitter, Reddit and beyond.
Just look in any of Piker's comment sections, past or present, and you won't have to dig deep to find a "Collargate" meme.
11. Jet2 Holiday (3.1% of Votes)
We got a new audio track to set all of our biggest fails, blunders and chaotic moments to this year and, for some reason, it's the narration to an advertisement for Jet2.
Jet2 is a British airline and holiday package provider. Whether you know that or not, you've probably heard the phrase, "Nothing beats a Jet2 holiday" somewhere on Instagram, TikTok or YouTube in 2025, likely while watching someone fall flat on their face or narrowly avoid death.
There's something about that happy British voice contrasted with horrifying footage that just hits different, earning the sound a spot on this list from the many fans of the meme.
10. Horse Race Tests (3.5% of Votes)
First up in our top 10 memes of 2025 comes the viral Horse Race Tests by Twitter user @snakesandrews, which absorbed all of our attention back in April.
Horse Race Test is a simple virtual horse-racing simulator in which a few crudely drawn, colorful horses bounce around a track until one of them eventually reaches the finish line.
Like pulling the arm on a slot machine, watching Horse Race Tests is scarily addicting, leading fans to pick favorite colors, draw fan art of their favorite horses and get just a little too competitive over something that involves zero skill. It's kind of like Umamusume, but with less anime girls and more imagination required.
Now, when can we get Horse Race Test machines in casinos?
9. SDIYBT (3.6% of Votes)
The slang term "twin" had a pretty hard rise in use this year, and the "SDIYBT" meme might have had something to do with that.
SDIYBT took off after a meme of a robotic SpongeBob saying the phrase to Plankton went viral on TikTok. The video spread all over the place, inspiring a whole lot of memes where characters ask people to SDIYBT, whether they want to or not.
It's stupid, and it's nonsense, but it was massive, and the memes really speak for themselves. That being said, please stop DIYBT and keep reading the list. We're over halfway through.
8. Chicken Jockey (4.4% of Votes)
Some of you might have forgotten that A Minecraft Movie came out this year, thanks to the fast pace that memes came at us in 2025, but how could we ever forget the "Chicken Jockey" meme?
Actor and musician Jack Black has been a consistently reliable source of memes for years, and Chicken Jockey might be one of his biggest contributions to the culture. The memes are based on his memorable delivery of the line "Chicken Jockey" in the film, which became a major vocal stim for many after the clip dropped online, inspiring everything from animations to brainrot memes and beyond.
There were a lot of memes that came from A Minecraft Movie, but based on its place in this list, Chicken Jockey stood above the rest as the most important to voters.
7. AI Baby Holding Laugh (4.6% of Votes)
Standing strong as one of the more acceptable uses of AI is the "AI Baby Holding a Laugh," a bizarre meme based on a video of a cheeky baby laughing in a way that no baby should.
This meme is actually an AI-assisted rotoscoping of a Douyin video that shows a man laughing and smiling at the camera. The video was brought to new heights, though, when it was baby-fied and attached to funny "just baby things" type captions.
The video has since been rotoscoped many times to depict a wide variety of characters striking the same poses, but none hit like that original creepy baby.
6. Italian Brainrot Animals (4.8% of Votes)
Italian Brainrot characters came at us hard and fast in January 2025, destroying our minds and ushering in the year of brainrot.
These weird videos featuring characters like "Tung Tung Tung Sahur," "Tralalero Tralala," and "Bombardiro Crocodilo," just to name a few, were embraced by kids and adults everywhere for their insane designs and confusing narration, spawning toys, games, trading cards and perhaps one of the strangest online phenomenon's in meme history.
Unlike a lot of memes, Italian Brainrot Animals proved to have longevity, remaining massively popular with kids months later and leading the way to Steal a Brainrot, one of the most popular games on Earth right now.
Think what you want about AI, but if Italian Brainrot shows us anything, it's that this technology thrives when applied to memes. Take that as you will.
5. James Doakes Reaction Images (5.1% of Votes)
First up in the top five is the wildly prevalent James Doakes reaction images and "But You Can't Prove It" memes.
This very classic-style meme format uses photos of Sgt. James Doakes from Dexter looking very suspicious to convey a feeling of being unable to prove something that you know is true, like, for example, when you suspect the CEO is having an affair with the HR head, but you couldn't prove it.
The meme plays off Doakes' character in the show perfectly and has proven massively flexible since it was popularized all throughout the year, proving that there will always be a place for reaction images and image macros in our increasingly AI and brainrot-driven meme landscape.
We've all felt like Doakes at one point in our lives, and it's nice to see that we finally have a way of expressing that feeling.
4. J.D. Vance Face Edits (6.2% of Votes)
Vice President of the United States, J.D. Vance, had a massive meme target on his back all year, as people discovered just how fun it was to edit his face to resemble a baby, make him bald and more.
Face edits were a bit of a trend this year, and the J.D. Vance edits might have been the memes that kicked it all off. These things were inescapable for months, and now that Vance has embraced them, they've only become more and more visible online.
Whether you fall on the left or right, there's a lot of joy to be had in seeing that curly-headed, red-faced edit under any and every post mentioning Vance in passing.
If you ever doubt that embracing the meme is a bad idea, just look at this trend to remind yourself why that's not the case.
3. Asgore Running Over Dess (7.5% of Votes)
Deltarune fans made themselves heard in 2025 by turning the concept of Asgore running over Dess into a huge meme both inside and outside of their community.
The memes are based on a fan theory that the character Asgore, adoptive father of the protagonist Kris, ran over and killed Dess Holiday in a car accident.
This inspired a pile of animations, edits and memes visualizing this scenario, which hilariously show Asgore chasing Dess down in his car and absolutely demolishing her. One of the most popular of these memes reimagine a scene from Open Season with Asgore and Dess, a GIF that still pops up all over the place.
This was a big year for Deltarune fans, so the meme's inclusion this high in the list is to be expected, especially considering the quality of the memes and the love that these games get from fans.
Chapter five when, though?
2. Kirkification / Charlie Kirk Face Swaps (11.2% of Votes)
To nobody's surprise, "Kirkification" is the number two meme of 2025, proving that the Charlie Kirk meme industry is still booming well into December.
This meme started back in September and, kind of like the J.D. Vance edits, is all about Charlie Kirk's face. The difference is that this time around, the idea is to place Kirk's face over anyone and everyone possible, whether they're a popular character, another celebrity, a well-known meme or just some random person appearing in the background of a meaningless photo.
If it can be Kirkified, it shall be Kirkified, and it will get big likes online.
Sure, the meme is arguably morally questionable, but so are a lot of popular things on the internet, and if Kirkification is anything, it is absolutely a popular thing on the internet.
1. 67 / The 67 Kid (27.5% of Votes)
Finally, coming in at number one and earning the coveted title of "Meme of the Year 2025" is the "67 Meme" and its face, the "67 Kid."
Whether you like it or not, there should be no doubt that 67 is the biggest meme of the year. This funny number, inspired by a rap song by Skrilla, started as a humble, throwaway TikTok format in January and spent all year evolving in strange new ways.
At its core, it doesn't mean anything, but it sure is fun to say, especially if you're a child who likes trolling and confusing all the adults in your life.
Six-Seven proved so strong in 2025 that even adults getting in on the meme didn't do much to kill it, which is usually a death sentence for weaker formats.
While the meme started with NBA edits, it has now become a worldwide phenomenon with its own hand gesture, spin-off memes like "41," and its own mascot in the 67 Kid.
Speaking of the 67 Kid, this young, ice cream-haired youngster became inseparable from the meme after he was filmed yelling "67!" at a school basketball game. His extreme Gen Alpha vibes combined with his passionate shout became instant meme fodder, ensuring that everyone would recognize his face across the internet in 2025.
He even inspired a weird SCP parody meme with "SCP-067," showing us just how much juice you can squeeze out of a simple number with enough effort.
Congratulations, 67 and the 67 Kid, for standing the test of time and becoming the meme of 2025. Will 67 continue to dominate in 2026, or will we get a new funny number to confuse people with? We'll just have to wait and see.
Looking for more of this year's best viral phenomena and memes? Be sure to check out our other 2025 meme roundups below: