People walk on a promenade in Beijing on February 26, 2026. Adek Berry/AFP via Getty Images hide caption

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Adek Berry/AFP via Getty Images

As relations between the world's two largest economies grow more tense, many young Americans are increasingly adopting what they consider to be Chinese cultural habits.

The most enthusiastic among them have come up with a name for this trend: "Chinamaxxing." In this installment of Word of the Week, we examine the internet phenomenon and the geopolitical and social media forces behind it.

The term's suffix, "maxxing," is internet slang that means going all in on something. For example, "looksmaxxers" are obsessed with optimizing their appearance, and "healthmaxxers" constantly share tips on improving personal well-being.

"Chinamaxxing" can mean drinking hot water instead of iced lattes, wearing house slippers indoors, or embracing traditional Chinese skincare routines. On TikTok and Instagram, users joke that they're entering a "very Chinese time" in their lives.

The trend has been amplified by Chinese diaspora influencers such as Sherry Zhu, who regularly shares herbal skincare recipes and advice on becoming a Chinese "baddie" (a baddie, of course, meaning a confident, attractive woman). What began as niche lifestyle content has since spilled into celebrity PR stunts by the likes of Timothée Chalamet playing ping-pong in Chengdu, and mainstream cultural debates.

Part of that shift came after popular livestreamers Hasan Piker and ISHOWSPEED traveled to China last year, broadcasting visits to high-tech megacities like Shanghai and Chongqing to millions of viewers. Their streams, featuring subway systems, dense skylines, and casual street interviews with ordinary people, were wildly popular on both American and Chinese social media.

Hasan Piker attends the 2025 Streamer Awards at The Wiltern on December 06, 2025 in Los Angeles, California. Jerod Harris/Getty Images North America hide caption

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Jerod Harris/Getty Images North America

In an interview with NPR, Piker framed the appeal of China in generational terms.

"Life is just getting worse, year over year," Piker said. "I'm buying the Applebees' cheeseburger you can dip into a vat of melted cheese. But at the same time, those treats are not enough for me to realize things are not great here. And then I turn on TikTok, and all of a sudden I see a video of Chongqing. They've got trains everywhere and it's this fascinating city."

Piker's trip, however, became a flashpoint in America's ongoing culture wars. Supporters praised his streams for humanizing ordinary Chinese people. Critics accused him of being an unwitting participant in a Chinese soft power campaign.

Public opinion data suggests Americans are deeply divided on how to approach China, with views often splitting along partisan lines.

According to Shaoyu Yuan, a New York–based scholar who studies Chinese soft power, the divide reflects how China has become entangled in U.S. identity politics and increasingly polarized information environments.

"People who mainly get China through politics and security headlines move towards a threat framing," Yuan says. "And people who get China through daily exposure and peer-to-peer culture tend to have a more mixed view."

Yuan notes that it's probably no accident that Chinamaxxing has flourished on TikTok. While the app's algorithm isn't public, Yuan suggests that the platform may operate on multiple levels at once: "One track weakens American narrative authority by highlighting content that highlights U.S. dysfunction, and in the same time, the other track makes China look more attractive."

People celebrate the start of the Lunar New Year, marking the Year of the Horse in New York's Chinatown on February 17, 2026 in New York City. Angela Weiss/AFP via Getty Images hide caption

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Angela Weiss/AFP via Getty Images

Other observers see the trend less as a reflection of China itself and more as a mirror held up to the United States. Yi-Ling Liu, a tech writer and the author of The Wall Dancers, which explores the Chinese internet, says the fascination reveals deep anxieties at home.

"Americans' perspective of China has shifted," Liu says. "And it's really rooted in the U.S.'s own insecurities about its dysfunction."

Some find the trend troubling. Cherie Wong, a Hong Kong Canadian activist who has testified before Canada's parliament on Chinese disinformation, has criticized the trend for reducing the complexities of Chinese identity into a set of tropes.

"In 2026, it's apparently cool to be Chinese. But before white people claim they're drinking hot water and they're in a very Chinese time, I'mma need you to stop.," Wong said in a recent Instagram video. "A very Chinese time in my ancestry was my grandparents seeing all their schoolteachers get executed for being intellectuals."

Wong told NPR she worries that even well-meaning influencers with a genuine curiosity about Chinese culture can end up reproducing state talking points.

Still, the researcher Shaoyu Yuan thinks that even superficial trends like Chinamaxxing may serve an unexpected purpose.

"Superficial trends can sometimes create the easiest entry point because cultural rivalries and geopolitical competition put people into defensive postures," Yuan says. "But lifestyle content, memes, can lower the temperature. That matters because dialogue usually starts with familiarity, not with agreement."