In China’s online spaces, something delightfully mundane has blown up: “16号集体洗头”—a tag that literally means “mass hair washing on the 16th.” That date happens to be Lunar New Year’s Eve in 2026, and social feeds are full of memes, selfies with shampoo lather, and jokes about booking salon slots en masse.
At the heart of the trend is an old belief about water, hair, and luck. Folk practice holds that washing your hair on the day of the new year can wash away wealth and good fortune, so people traditionally do it before the new lunar year begins. Young people leaned into that idea with a wink—turning a hygiene choice into what many are calling “National Hair Washing Day.”
On platforms like Weibo, the hashtag has raced up hot search charts, fueled by playful challenges, shampoo product tie-ins, and people tagging each other to show their “rituals.” Whether it’s about literal cleanliness or symbolic cleansing, the collective buzz reveals how Chinese youth remix centuries-old customs for digital culture—all while laughing together at something as simple as suds and selfies.
Cover image via Nano Banana Pro/RADII.
