Jiafei Is Real

About

Jiafei Is Real refers to a viral debate on the internet surrounding the iconic Jiafei meme being a real person after people claimed they found who the Chinese woman behind the photoshopped images was in late 2023. The model from Beijing, China, surnamed Dai, stated via a post on Douyin (China's version of TikTok) that the meme uses one of her selfies taken in December 2020. The news rapidly inspired a wave of memes and posts from her fandom in October and November 2023.

Origin

On October 16th, 2023, a model named Dai from Beijing, China, posted a video on Douyin purportedly revealing that she is the real^[1] Jiafei, sharing the original image that went viral back in 2021. She also shared two more photos from the session in her post as evidence (shown below).

A few days later, on October 26th, the TikTok^[2] account @jiafei.dai shared an English-captioned version of the original video (shown below, left) in which Dai says she only found out about the memes in June 2023 after a friend told her. The post amassed over 971,000 plays and 97,000 likes in two weeks.

On October 30th, @jiafei.dai uploaded a video^[3] speaking in English commenting about the Jiafei meme and stating this will be her only official channel on the platform, as multiple parody accounts and bots were created using her image. The video (shown below, right) received more than 2.6 million plays and 425,000 likes in a week.

Spread

The news that Jiafei was a real person was celebrated by her fandom on TikTok over the following weeks. For example, on October 24th, 2023, TikTok^[4] user @flopzdaily posted a video using @jiafei.dai's content paired with an overlay text celebrating that Jiafei is real and that she acknowledged the "flops," the nickname of her fans. The video (shown below, left) received roughly 902,000 plays and 172,000 likes in two weeks.

On November 8th, TikTok^[5] user @mashaaslayed uploaded a video of Dai singing the Jiafei parody music "Ye Hua Xiang." The video (shown below, right), amassed over 1.5 million plays and 343,000 likes in a day.

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References