What Is a Snowball Kiss? How TikTok Misread a NSFW Term and Accidentally Made It Viral

What Is a Snowball Kiss?

A snowball kiss doesn’t have two meanings—just one. And if you’ve Googled it expecting something cute or romantic, well… you’re not the only one who made that mistake.

In its original form, as defined on Urban Dictionary back in 2004, a snowball kiss refers to the exchange of semen via kissing after oral sex. It’s explicit, not remotely subtle, and definitely not something you want popping up on a shared screen.

But somewhere along the way, TikTok latched onto the sound of the phrase—light, frosty, flirty—and imagined something more innocent. That mismatch between expectation and reality is exactly what caused the chaos.

TikTok Didn’t Start a Trend—It Started a Misunderstanding

There’s no evidence of a TikTok challenge where people passed ice cubes or cold drinks to each other mid-kiss and called it a “snowball kiss.” What actually happened is far more… TikTok.

Some users likely stumbled across the term—maybe through meme pages, comment sections, or the “don’t Google this” rabbit hole—and assumed it was something sweet. Something wintery.

@cocktails We saw @Meg Quinn ‘s genius Ghost Bombs and we decided to make them festive for the holiday season! Snowball Bombs are the cutest treat to sweeten up your cocktails! #snowball #snowballbombs #cottoncandy #cocktails #sweet #yummy #cute #fun #festive #easyideas #christmas #winterwonderland #winter #fyp ♬ original sound – Viral cocktails

Maybe even related to cocktails like “snowball bombs” or aesthetic videos tagged with “snowfall kiss.”

@morguyen
Our first snowfall kiss
♬ Thats my place – Mitch Mullins

But once they searched it, the tone shifted fast.

What they expected was cute. What they got was explicit. That dissonance is what made the term blow up again—not the existence of any actual couple trend.

@georgethepig0307 tried a what?? #fypp #blowthisup ♬ original sound – skinny legend

The Real Origin (And Why It Never Changed)

The phrase has always meant what it means now. Urban Dictionary has defined it the same way for over two decades.

It was part of a wave of early 2000s slang designed to shock, back when internet culture thrived on the boundary-pushing and absurd. Nothing about its origin suggests intimacy, romance, or iced beverages.

So the reappearance of “snowball kiss” in 2025 didn’t come from a rebrand—it came from an innocent misunderstanding going viral.

Meme Pages and Curiosity Took Over

After the initial confusion, meme culture did the rest.

Sites like Know Your Meme catalogued the fallout, as creators began reacting in real time to the discovery of the term’s true definition. The virality didn’t stem from participation. It came from people laughing, gasping, and warning others not to make the same Google mistake they did.

The meme cycle fed itself, and a forgotten slang term was back in the spotlight—because it didn’t match the image people expected.

The Real Trend? Getting It Wrong

Today, related searches like:

“snowball kiss meaning”
“what is a snowball kiss TikTok”
“don’t Google snowball kiss”
“what is snowballing”

tell you everything you need to know. The virality wasn’t driven by content—it was driven by curiosity and misinterpretation.

The phrase snowballed (pun very much intended) into relevance again, all because of what people thought it might mean.

Still Curious?

There was never a snowball kiss trend. No challenge. No romantic couple videos. Just a name that sounded playful enough to pass as one—until it didn’t.

The internet didn’t fall for a new idea. It fell for an old term wearing a deceptively sweet disguise.

It’s not a kiss. It’s a glitch in the algorithm.