By Elaine Viets
Have you heard about salmonmaxxing?
How about bearmaxxing?
No? Then you might be behind on your internet trends, not to mention keeping up with the newest words.
Dictionary.com nominated maxxing as its 2026 Word of the Year. Maxxing goes back to maximize and verbs like max, as in the woeful sentence, “I maxed out my credit cards.”
But maxed has gone up in the word world. It has picked up an extra x, and begun a more glamorous life.
Now there’s the trendy salmonmaxxing, where people gulp down lots of salmon, and debate whether fresh wild salmon or flash-frozen is healthier. From what I can tell, farm-raised Atlantic salmon is winning that debate.
Bearmaxxing is even wilder. That’s where you channel your “inner bear” by eating stacks of salmon, often raw, in one sitting. It’s hard to beat the average bear’s bearmaxxing: they can pound down some 30 to 40 salmon a day, for about 160,000 calories.
You can also feed your inner bear by gulping down berries.
So far, bearmaxxers don’t seem to be interested in other delicacies in the ursine diet, including ants, termites, larvae and the occasional luscious lizard. Yum.
Bearmaxxing may not be as healthy as the net would have you believe. Bears often get tapeworms and other parasites from eating raw salmon.
But we haven’t maxed out max yet. There’s also looksmaxxing, a trend where you improve your appearance so you look your best.
Sounds harmless, right? Who doesn’t want to look as good as they can?
Like any trend, it can be taken to extremes. And writer Elliot Nash calls looksmaxxing “the toxic internet trend obsessed with male esthetics.”
The looksmaxxing subculture has its own slang, he says.
Softmaxxing is the benign version, where men improve their appearance with skincare, grooming, fitness and fashion. All low-risk efforts.
Pec implants and various other cosmetic surgeries are more dangerous.
Mewing is a “technique that involves pressing the tongue against the roof of the mouth to supposedly improve jawline definition over time.” It doesn’t work.
Neither does chewmaxxing, “chewing hard gum or tough foods” to strengthen jaw muscles and improve your jawline.
Then there’s bonesmashing, “the belief that repeatedly striking facial bones can reshape them or stimulate growth.” Brrr.
But if you’re serious, the reward for looksmaxxing is mogging, which means to “outshine someone or something.” The Collins Dictionary made that its Word of the Year.
Here are a few more entries from around the net:
Firewaves, “a series of urban wildfires in a short space of time.”
P(doom) is short for probability of doom. It’s “an estimation of the probability that artificial intelligence will bring about the collapse of human civilization.”
Unc, uncool. An insult.
Neckbeard. Officially, it’s a “beard that partially covers the area under the chin and the throat.”
Unofficially, it’s an insult. A neckbeard is “a socially awkward gamer or computer nerd.” Or a woman-hater or ultraconservative Internet troll.
There are thousands of new words in 2026, but I’ll leave you with two favorites now welcomed into dictionaries:
Trash panda. A raccoon.
Promposal, a combination of “prom” and “proposal.” That’s the custom of inviting someone to the prom, often with elaborate signs, serenades or even flash mobs, three to six weeks before the big dance. March 11 is National Promposal Day.
What are some of your favorite new words?
Speaking of words, three of my Dead-End Job mysteries will be on sale this month in the US and Canada for $1.99 each. Treat yourself to MURDER BETWEEN THE COVERS, JUST MURDERED, MURDER UNLEASHED, and HALF-PRICE HOMICIDE.