About

"Snails Sleep 3" refers to a Google search result for the query "how long do snails sleep", which shows a picture of a snail next to the word "three." On Reddit, the Google search is often mocked for failing to provide a unit of measurement, and is referenced as an in-joke within the /r/funny and /r/me_irl subreddits.

Origin

On February 28th, 2016, Redditor Unidan_nadinU submitted a post titled "Units of measurement are for suckers," featuring a screenshot of a Google search page with the search query "How long do snails sleep" followed by a result containing the word "three" (shown below).

Spread

On March 1st, Redditor Lefty156 submitted a Sir, You've Been In a Coma image featuring a snail wearing two cowboy hats with the caption "Wot'n rest'n relaxation?" to /r/me_irl (shown below, left).^[3] The following day, Redditor Helixpls submitted a post suggesting that the Snails Sleep 3 memes were "somewhat promising" to /r/memeeconomy,^[2] along with an Expanding Brain image (shown below, right). Over the next four days, the post garnered upwards of 6,400 votes (88% upvoted) and 100 comments.

On March 5th, Redditor catdany submitted a snail-themed "You've been visited by" image urging viewers to "upvote in the next 3 or never sleep again" (shown below, left). The same day, Redditor ExtremeBloxinator posted a picture of a shirt with Gary the Snail from Spongebob Squarepants on the front (shown below, right), claiming the shirt would be purchased if the post "gets three." Within 24 hours, the posts gained over 157,000 votes (61% upvoted) and 4,500 votes (85% upvoted) on /r/me_irl^[4][5] respectively.

Search Interest

External References