Last Updated on 04/11/2021 by Dean
What does the TriHard emote mean on Twitch?
The TriHard emote has many different meanings. The naming suggests you to use it whenever someone is trying too hard on stream but the emote can also be used to convey nervousness, surprise, fear and so on.
What is the origin of the TriHard emote on Twitch?
The TriHard emote is a cut-out of Twitch streamer TriHex’s face. How the TriHard emote was created is actually documented by TriHex himself.
At a 2012 anime convention in Texas called A-KON 32, TriHex was photographed with a girl doing the famed TriHard expression. While going through the photos from the event on stream, Trihex’s friend, Shades, suggested he should crop his face and in his words “use it for stuff” because “it pops out”.
TriHex immediately proceeded to launch photoshop on stream and create the cutout which he then tweeted out to his fans stating it would be the future TriHex twitch emoticon:
http://t.co/toMPbUYo!
— trihex (@trihex) June 12, 2012
Future Twitch Trihex Emoticon right here! <3
The video of TriHex creating the TriHard emote is below.
At this point the emote was just a meme of course and it wasn’t an official Twitch emote just yet.
Towards the end of 2012, some of his fans suggested to turn the TriHex cutout into a Twitch emote which led a Twitch admin to show up to Hex’ stream.
TriHex, realizing that Twitch staff was watching him, decided to go a little extra on his stream and tried to speedrun the hardest Yoshi’s islands level.
The staff then asked, “why are you trying so hard“? And that’s when the TriHard emote was born. Making the name of the emote the combination of his username ‘TriHex’ and him being such a TryHard.
How did TriHard become so popular?
While the origin story of TriHard is wholesome, the reason TriHard is so popular is more controversial than that.
The TriHard emote blew up in the chat of IcePoseidon, one of the most if not the most controversial IRL Twitch streamers ever. During IcePoseidon streams, the TriHard emote was frequently spammed and that made his chat alone responsible for over 38,000,000 uses of this emote.
This increase in use by a toxic community such as IcePoseidons led the emote to be used whenever a black person was seen on stream. If this wasn’t damaging enough, the TriHard emote was often accompanied by racist slurs.
You can watch the video of the story of TriHard below.
For a while, the TriHard emote was the most used emote on Twitch. As of right now, according to stream elements, TriHard is the second most used Twitch emote.
When to use TriHard on Twitch
If you see someone is trying too hard on stream, it’s time for the TriHard emote. It can also be used to convey fear, surprise or whenever a nerve-wracking moment occurs on a stream.
Controversy behind the TriHard emote
- The TriHard emote is often spammed by anonymous Twitch users whenever a black person appears on stream.
- IcePoseidons toxic chat community is responsible for over 38,000,000 uses of the TriHard emote.
- Popular twitch streamer XQC was suspended for 4 matches from the OWL (Overwatch League) after he used a TriHard 7 emote in the chat when caster Malik Forte showed up on stream.
- Some popular streamers, such as HasanAbi, have the TriHard emote banned from their chats to avoid them being used for racist reasons.
Why is TriHard banned on Twitch?
TriHard is actually not a banned emote on Twitch. By default, you can use the emote on any Twitch channel. However, due to the racist past of the emote, some Twitch streamers have banned the emote from being used in their chat.
Another emote that is frequently banned for the same reasons is cmonBruh.
Should TriHard be banned on Twitch?
While some streamers have the emote banned, the TriHard emote can still be used in most channels on Twitch. With TriHard and cmonBruh often being used in racist settings, many streamers and viewers believe the emotes should be banned from Twitch for good.
As a comment, TriHex, the creator and face of the emote, created a Youtube video to express his thoughts about banning the TriHard emote.
In the video, he explains that as long as you’re not hurting anyone, you are fine doing whatever you want online.
He says he doesn’t believe the TriHard emote should be banned because TriHard is NOT supposed to be a racist emote in the first place.
He also mentions that removing TriHard just because it is being used by racist anonymous chat-users, won’t remove their racism. What’s to stop them from moving on to other emotes such as cmonBruh or KevinTurtle…?
I agree with TriHex, I don’t think banning the emote will change much as these racist people will just jump to the next best thing. I can understand why some streamers ban the emote from their streams out of frustration though, as was the case with HasanAbi.
What is the meaning of TriHard 7?
The TriHard emote is often followed by the number 7 when spammed on chat. The meaning of the 7 is used to represent a salute because the head aligns with the hand of the number 7. So a TriHard 7 emote can be a way of saluting or saying hi on stream.
TriHard 7 brings a lot of controversy with it because it would be used as a way to say ‘hi’ whenever a black person appears on stream. The use of this ‘salute’ is also what got XQC suspended from the OWL.