Durchscrollen

Durchscrollen is a German verb that describes the act of scrolling through a page or feed by continuously moving the finger or cursor. It is most commonly used in digital contexts, such as social media feeds, news aggregators, or long lists of items. The term encapsulates a rapid, often passive, consumption of large amounts of content.

Origin and form: The word is formed from durch (through) and scrollen (to scroll). It is a relatively new loanword in German, borrowed from English usage. In everyday speech it is used as a separable verb: ich scrolle durch den Feed; ich habe durchgescrollt.

Usage and effects: Durchscrollen describes a browsing pattern characterized by continuous scrolling, frequently without a definite goal. It is associated with endless scrolling interfaces and can lead to extensive, time-consuming content consumption. The term is often used in discussions about digital well-being, attention economy, and phenomena such as doomscrolling.

Variants and related terms: Das Durchscrollen can be used as a noun. Related concepts include endloses Scrollen (endless scrolling) and doomscrolling in German discourse; to describe the action one might say durchscrollen or durchs Scrollen in different stylistic contexts.

Context: In media and UX discussions, durchscrollen is used to describe user behavior and to critique interface design that encourages prolonged consumption. It is not inherently negative and can describe neutral or incidental behavior; the connotation depends on context.