About

Taylor Swift's "August," also known as Salt Air, refers to memes about the song "august" by American singer-songwriter Taylor Swift, which resurfaced every August 1st to honor the song's legacy. Many of the memes focused on the song's lyrics, "Salt air, and the rust on your door / I never needed anything more." The song was released in 2020 as part of Swift's album folklore. It's yearly, fixed resurfacing mimicked the Mariah Carey Defrosting meme and comparisons between both were made online. Taylor Swift "August" memes and Salt Air memes surfaced on TikTok, Twitter / X and Reddit, among other social media platforms that Swift's fans, often called "Swifties," frequented.

Origin

On July 24th, 2020, Taylor Swift released the album folklore with the 8th track named "august." The song's lyrics begin with, "Salt air, and the rust on your door / I never needed anything more / Whispers of 'Are you sure?' / 'Never have I ever before.'"^[1][2] The song's official lyric video was shared to YouTube ^[10] on that day, gaining over 118.3 million views and 1 million likes in five years (shown below).

On August 2nd, 2020, X^[3] user @jillboard tweeted, "August… Taylor Swift predicted this," gaining over 38,000 likes in five years (shown below). The tweet is currently the first known piece of viral content to joke about the song.

Spread

A year later, on August 2nd, 2021, X^[4] user @spotify_swift claimed that Taylor Swift's "august" received over 561,000 streams on Spotify on August 1st. The post gained over 6,600 likes in four years (shown below).

On July 31st, 2023, X^[5] user @tayspetsch tweeted, "It’s officially 'august' by Taylor Swift month," attaching an object labeled iteration of the Ken on Barbie's Shoulder meme. Over two years, the tweet received over 73,000 likes (shown below).

On July 26th, 2025, TikToker^[7] @piotrek_am posted a video of Taylor Swift opening her eyes, captioned, "Me as soon as the clock hits midnight on July 31st." The video was set to the opening of "august." Over six days, the video gained over 481,500 likes (shown below).

On July 31st, TikToker^[6] @jamesmaximoff posted an edit of Taylor Swift "defrosting," riffing on the Mariah Carey Defrosting meme that resurfaces every year before Christmas. In a day, the video received roughly 227,400 likes (shown below).

On July 31st, 2025, the X^[9] account @PopBase tweeted a photo of Swift, captioned, "August has begun," gaining over 63,000 likes in a day.

On August 1st, X^[8] user @satrnreturn quote-tweeted @PopBase, writing, "I promise you nobody thinks of Taylor Swift when the month of August beings," gaining over 3,500 likes in a few hours (shown below).

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References