About

Shakira On the Computer or the Shakira Computer Meme is a reaction image and series of image macro memes based on a viral photograph of Colombian musical artist Shakira sitting at a computer and typing, looking to the right and smiling at the camera. Despite her typing position, the computer is turned off.

The photograph was reportedly taken by photographer Óscar Berrocal in 1997 in the newsroom of El Heraldo, a Colombian newspaper. It first became the subject of Spanish-language image macro memes as early as January 2018. Later that month, the meme inspired English-language variants on Reddit, continuing to spread over the following years.

In August 2026, Shakira went viral for recreating the meme, causing a resurgence in virality surrounding the meme as it was discussed on social media and covered in the news.

Origin

The photograph of Shakira sitting at the computer and smiling was reportedly taken by Óscar Berrocal in 1997 for El Heraldo, a Colombian newspaper.^[1]

The photograph began spreading as the subject of memes among Spanish-speaking social media users in January 2018.

On January 19th, 2018, El Mundo^[2] published an article about the meme, which includes several examples of image macros based on the photo. One example of the meme offers luck in browsing the web to those who happen upon the image.

Spread

On January 28th, 2018, Redditor butterxoxo posted the earliest known English version of the meme to the /r/thesims^[3] subreddit, captioned, "Me canceling my plans to stay home and play The Sims," garnering over 1,800 upvotes in eight years.

On January 31st, Redditor missjardinera posted the image to the /r/OldSchoolCool^[4] subreddit, garnering over 44,000 upvotes in eight years.

That day, Redditor Samrojas0 posted the image to the /r/photoshopbattles^[5] subreddit, garnering over 200 upvotes and several photoshops of the picture.

On July 20th, 2025, Tumblr^[6] user bintro posted a version of the meme captioned, "I was sooo locked in today, didn't get anything done. But I was like super aware of it," garnering over 54,000 Notes in a year.

August 2026 Recreation

On August 4th, 2026, Shakira posted a photograph that recreated the meme on her Instagram^[7] account, writing, "Me da la impresión de que ya he visto esto hace algún tiempo," which translates to, "I get the impression that I've already seen this some time ago," garnering over 950,000 likes in a day.

In the recreation, she is seen notably printing a photograph of a dog rather than typing on a computer.

The recreated meme and image garnered significant attention over the following days, including a post by the X^[8] / Twitter account Pop Base on August 4th, which included the two images side by side, receiving over 4.5 million views and 126,000 likes in a day.

That same day, Shakira's Instagram post was reposted to the /r/popculturechat^[9] subreddit, garnering over 4,000 upvotes and 160 comments in a day.

Also on August 4th, 2026, Redditor countingc used the image in a meme shared to the /r/popheadscirclejerk^[10] subreddit, receiving over 810 upvotes and 20 comments in a day.

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References