About

Wgat It Is or Time Traveller What It Is is a series of ironic brainrot memes popularized by Instagram Reels user timetravellerwhatyouplaying in which the phrase "wgat it is," an intentional misspelling of "what it is," is edited into a variety of memes in nonsensical ways. The account began posting variations of the same time traveler image macro, which features the phrase "what it is," daily starting in May 2024 and in early December, started posting more ironic memes using the misspelled word "wgat" and phrase "wgat it is." Some of the memes went viral and began to see use by other social media users. The meme also became associated with the Chopped Chin meme.

Origin

On May 7th, 2024, Instagram^[1] user timetravellerwhatyouplaying posted an image macro to Instagram Reels featuring an image of Kevin Hart captioned, "Time Traveller: What You Playing? Me: Minecraft 2 Time Traveler: Minecraft 2 what it is," garnering around 450 likes in eight months.

The user continued to regularly post the exact same meme to Reels, sometimes changing the game named in the meme from "Minecraft 2" to something else or editing Kevin Hart in some way. On December 2nd, the same Instagram^[2] user posted an absurd meme depicting a giant smiley face getting squished by two walls, one wall labeled "your left thigh" and the other "your right thigh." The top text reads, "this could be us what 8 it is," garnering over 5.7 million views in a month. This is the earliest known meme to use the phrase "wgat it is."

Spread

The account timetravellerwhatyouplaying continued to post brainrot memes, including many that use the phrase "wgat it is" or simply the word "wgat." For example, on December 5th, the account posted a reel to Instagram^[3] reading, "There's a Lake in Finland that looks like Finland wgat it is Finland," garnering over 1.2 million views in a month.

The phrase "wgat it is" became a popular catchphrase among Instagram Reels users as a referential comment. On December 9th, X^[4] user @jo333ny posted the original "time traveler" meme, with numerous commenters posting versions of the "wgat it is" meme in the comments, garnering over 1,100 likes in a month.

The meme became associated with other brainrot memes, like Chopped Chin, in January 2025. For example, on January 1st, 2025, Instagram^[5] user choppedchinsister posted a Chopped Chin meme using the phrase, garnering over 1,600 likes in a week.

On January 8th, X^[6] user @D00dlerEthan posted an image of Friday Night Funkin characters, writing, "#fridaynightfunkin wgat it is," garnering over 1,400 likes in under a day.

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References