ASMR is something you either get—and fall deep down the rabbit hole—or stay the hell away from. I remember discovering ASMR accidentally around 2014, when I was trying to massage my aching foot after a punishing afternoon of track practice; I stumbled on a “reflexology” video whose narration and background music were so oddly relaxing that it kept me coming back even when I wasn’t in pain. Over the years, I got so into watching ASMR to unwind that I forced myself to quit because I thought I was addicted.
For the uninitiated, ASMR stands for “Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response,” and it refers to a subjective phenomenon where people report feeling “tingles,” or a kind of warm current running down their spine, neck, or head in response to audiovisual stimuli such as tapping wooden blocks or squishing slime. It’s like a jacuzzi for the jaded, exhausted mind.
The content genre kicked off on forums and YouTube in the early 2010s and went mainstream by the end of the decade. Suddenly, there were ASMR superbowl ads, news reports, a 21 Savage song called “asmr” where the rapper whispers softly over a menacing Metro Boomin beat, and ASMR YouTubers (ASMRtists) with millions of subscribers. It’s hard to believe that the video style hasn’t been totally exhausted of ideas and converted into a soulless influencer content farm. Returning to watch videos this year, what’s shocked me the most is how weird, extreme, and tingly the content is.
For the vanilla relaxers, there’s still tons of entry-level ASMRtistry being made: the soap carvers, the gentle whisperers, the cranial nerve exam roleplayers. But for the real heads, the tingle trench vets who now suffer from tingle immunity—the term for when you listen too much and develop a tolerance to basic ASMR methods, requiring “harder” ASMR substances—there’s been something like a nuclear tingles race for mutually assured relaxation. A slew of new metas has emerged, from spit-painting to “overexplaining simple things” to the “Giving You a Black Market Lobotomy” roleplay craze. The titles beg you to click: Deep Cerebral Penetration. ASMR 8D to 32D! 200% Sensitive Deep Whisper You Can FEEL in Your Ears. There are types of clips I couldn’t even have imagined half a decade ago, like ASMR that’s basically avant-garde breath play and videos so frantic they’re more like anguish-inducing anti-ASMR.
