Doomscrolling is the habit of continuously scrolling through bad news and distressing social media content, even when it makes you feel worse. The term gained widespread use during the COVID-19 pandemic, when anxiety drove many people to compulsively check feeds for updates even as the content was clearly affecting their mood.
Platforms are designed to keep users engaged regardless of emotional state, which makes doomscrolling easy to fall into. For social media managers and content creators, it’s a useful reminder that audiences don’t always want relentlessly heavy content - and that knowing when to step back from the feed is as important as staying plugged in.
