KEKW Meaning – The Origins of the KEKW Emote

If you’re a Twitch user or stumble upon a gaming livestream, you’ve probably seen the KEKW emote. The emote came about thorough the renaissance of Twitch emotes that spawned ResidentSleeper, Pogchamp, MonkaS, LULW, Kappa and many others through the years. In this article, we will take a close look at the origins and KEKW meaning. A blend of a famous video and common gamer slang gave rise to one of the most commonly used Twitch emotes out there.

KEKW Origins

featuring the Spanish Laughing Guy, who is an actor and comedian named Juan Joya Borja. The YouTube video that made him famous is almost guaranteed to make you laugh even if you don’t understand a word of what he says in it. And that’s because the person’s way of talking and laughing is simply contagious. This video also has a great quality: because it’s in a foreign language that few people can understand, it can be used as a template with any subtitles you wish. And lots of meme creators and internet comedians did exactly that, in order to give more power to their message. Subsequently, it became viral and was quickly added to the Internet’s catalog of memes. So why not reference it in a Twitch emote?

But enough about that. Let’s see what KEKW means.

KEKW Meaning

The meaning of KEKW is quite basic: it suggests laughter. And that’s why the Spanish Laughing Guy image was used to represent it on Twitch. Now you may ask: “But what is KEK?” And the answer is simple: KEK is the Koreans’ equivalent of the North American or European LOL. Or, if you’re from the CIS region, you may also add XAXAXAXA to the list.

KEK however is also how World of Warcraft transcribes LOL between opposing factions. If a Horde player writes LOL in chat, an Alliance player will read KEK. In the opposite way LOL transcribes to Bur.

Next to KEK we also have the letter W. And this letter is basically a suffix often used for Twitch emotes to convey an exaggerated facial expression. Hence the emote KEKW. Much like in our natural languages, the language of memes and emotes often creates a new element by putting two existing elements together.

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The Popularization of the KEKW Emote

The KEKW emote became popular on Twitch around August 2019, after popular streamers such as AdmiralBulldog and xQc started using it in their streaming sessions. Thanks to their efforts, KEKW awareness grew rapidly and the KEKW emote pretty much replaced LUL, ROFL and other ways of expressing hysterical laughter.

At the moment, KEKW is one of the most used 15 emotes on Twitch. Given how ridiculously famous the scene with the Spanish comedian has become, it’s only natural that people use this emote to illustrate more vividly that they’re laughing. Or, to be more precise, that something is worth laughing at.

Potential KEKW Remixes

No doubt, people will take KEKW one step further. Just like lol turned into lul, then lulz or omegalul, KEKW is almost guaranteed to keep evolving as people feel the need to take it to the next level of absurdity. Of course, this is true just in writing. The Twitch emote will likely stay the same for a long time to come. But when you’re posting or reading something on Twitter, it’s perfectly viable to use or see a KEKW variation that uses the letter W as the start of a new word, such as KEKWhat or KEKWow.

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