Copyright TODAY
Is your child walking around the house answering all questions with the words “six seven”? Are you deeply confused as to what it means? The TODAY.com team is here to help. You may be seeing it written out on social media as “67,” implying a pronunciation of “sixty-seven,” but it’s actually being said as “six seven” and often is accompanied by a double hand gesture you would use to tell someone that you’re weighing two options. The term flooded TikTok — the app currently shows 1.1 million related videos — and made its way into everyday text-speak and slang. Despite its prevalence, many people don’t actually know what it means. One TikTok user made an explainer video essentially saying that the phrase has so little meaning that it can be used in a wide variety of ways that, ultimately, do make sense to the user. Got it? Let’s break it down for the rest of us. Where Did the Term 6-7 Originate? The numbers paired with their sing-songy tone dates back to December 2024, when hip hop artist Skrilla released a song called “Doot Doot.” In the song, he raps, “6-7, I just bipped right on the highway (bip, bip).” In a TikTok video posted on Aug. 18, teacher and education content creator Mr. Lindsay — self-dubbed the “OG Student Translator” — explained how it went from catchy tune to viral sensation. Mr. Lindsay said he defined the term back in February, but the volume of questions he was still getting — “daily” — about it in August led him to make another video. “It has blown up even more,” he said. Social media users started pairing the audio as background for their videos. Then, one creator used it to say NBA player LaMelo Ball plays basketball like he’s six-foot-two-inches tall when he’s actually six-foot-seven. “This meme goes viral,” Mr. Lindsay said. “Everybody is making edits, everybody is saying ‘six seven,’ all of these content creators are starting to put ‘six seven’ into all of their things.” He explained that the meme eventually transcended social media, and basketball players across leagues started saying it during press conferences and during on-court interviews. Taylen “TK” Kinney is a point guard in the Overtime Elite league who was known for overusing the lyric-turned-slang in interviews. More recently, fans thought he marked the end of the trend when he answered a question with “five” instead of the expected two-number combination. How Are People Using “6-7” Slang Now? As Mr. Lindsay explained, the term was picked up by non-hoopers. Questions like “How tall are you,” “What time is it,” “What’s that?” all get the response of “six seven,” Mr. Lindsay said. “There’s literally no circumstance where a kid might not say, ‘six seven.’” Content creators started using it for pretty much anything. Other athletes paired the tune with videos showing off their jersey numbers, and some people have even turned it into a funny soundtrack for getting older. “So, all of this to say, ‘six seven’ is just a reference to a meme,” Mr. Lindsay concluded. “There’s no real meaning to it. It is a number that is fun to say … with the hand motions, and it just doesn’t mean anything.”
