Where Does The Word 'Dupe' Come From? TikTok's Viral 'DOOP' Trend, Explained

The beauty and makeup community has long held a monopoly over the word dupe, despite its origins as essential gamer lingo. The original "dupe," from the word "duplicate," was an inauthentic video collectible. But the word has now come to mean much more, signifying general consumer trends that aspire for luxury but settle for the nearest cheap alternative, or "dupe." A

s of 2023, it has become a viral ironic trend to walk into a local Walmart and grab things that might be "dupes" for other items, a phrase delivered with the obnoxious inflection, "DOOP." But how did we get from RuneScape lingo to yelling DOOP at everything? Read on for a linguistic history, in meme terms.

Where Does The Word 'Dupe' Come From?

The word "dupe" was first widely used as video game lingo online. Specifically, "duping" was the act of cheating or coding to replicate rare collectible items in early video games, a notable example being the Magenta or Purple Party Hat on RuneScape. The item used to be a highly valued rare collectible, and despite all efforts, it has become the noob's party hat.

But dupes in beauty lingo aren't the same as counterfeit merchandise. The dupe for a luxury makeup or beauty item isn't a name-for-name knockoff; rather, it is a cheaper alternative comparable in shade, texture or effect. Some of the earliest mentions of the word dupe in relation to makeup were people desperately looking for dupes of expensive MAC cosmetic products, leading to a whole genre of finding-MAC-dupes videos on YouTube.

Why Is The Word 'Dupe' Having A Resurgence?

A Google affiliated think-tank revealed that searches for the word "dupe" rose by over 40 percent every year in the 2010s, with some people thinking that this trend might be an indicator of an impending economic downturn. The relationship between people looking for low-cost alternatives to luxury goods and current tensions about a recession has brought the use of the term "dupe" under newfound scrutiny.

What Is The TikTok 'DOOP' Trend?

Sometime between 2022 and 2023, young people began to parody "dupe" culture, likely in reaction to the constant media attention and think-piece culture that surrounds the word. The trend is simple; walk around your local Walmart, Costco or similar low-cost supermarket, grab items at random and deem them to be "dupes" for their luxury counterparts. This delivery is sometimes exaggerated to the point where the word sounds like "DOOP."

How Do You Use The Word 'Dupe' In A Sentence?

• "I think I just found a dupe for the Skims collection."
• "I got a drugstore Dupe for MAC Cosmetics and it worked great!"

For the full history of the word dupe, be sure to check out our entry on the slang term here for even more information.