hipster

• (A person interested in the latest trends): hepster (dated) ^[1]

From hip +‎ -ster. First attested for someone carrying something on their hip in the U.S. in the 1920s. Attested as a variant of hepster in the 1940s, for a follower of the latest fashions/trends/styles.^[1]

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ˈhɪp.stə/

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

• (US) IPA^(key): /ˈhɪp.stɚ/

hipster (plural hipsters)

1. A person who is keenly interested in the latest trends or fashions. [from earlier 20th c.]

   Synonyms: hepster, trendite; see also Thesaurus:fashionable person

   • c. 1954, Jack Kerouac, Untitled poem, in Book of Sketches, 1952-57, Penguin, 2006, p. 239,

     I, poor French Canadian Ti Jean become / a big sophisticated hipster esthete in / the homosexual arts […]

   • 1991 August 10, Chris Nealon, “Get A Life”, in Gay Community News, volume 19, number 4, page 10:

     Clare grapples with the idea that she, a well-dressed city hipster, will soon be in the boondocks raising a child with two men who are as much in love with each other as with her: "I'm not this unusual," she stammers. "It's just my hair."

   • 2008 June 16, Ben Ratliff, “Pop Veterans Still Pumping Anti-Charisma”, in The New York Times‎^[1], archived from the original on 9 February 2021:

     Donald Fagen and Walter Becker seem like the kind of late-1960s hypercerebral born-cynical East Coast hipsters who are often found valorizing authenticity in aesthetic expression.

   • 2019 February 28, “The hipster effect: Why anti-conformists always end up looking the same”, in MIT Technology Review‎^[2], archived from the original on 4 April 2025:

     And his conclusion is that in a vast range of scenarios, the hipster population always undergoes a kind of phase transition in which members become synchronized with each other in opposing the mainstream. In other words, the hipster effect is the inevitable outcome of the behavior of large numbers of people.

2. A member of Bohemian counterculture.
3. An aficionado of jazz who considers himself or herself to be hip.

   Synonym: hepcat

4. (US, obsolete, Prohibition) A person who wears a hip flask (of alcohol). ^[2][1]
5. (US, obsolete, 1930s) A dancer, particularly a female one.^[1]
6. Underwear with an elastic waistband at hip level.

(Prohibition):

• vial villain ^[2]
• gentleman from Kentucky ^[2] (from Kentucky backcountry moonshine)

(Prohibition):

• bootlegging (n.)
• bootleg (v.) (from hiding flasks in the boot, or stocking)

(Prohibition):

• suffer from hip disease (v.) ^[2]

hipster (third-person singular simple present hipsters, present participle hipstering, simple past and past participle hipstered)

1. To behave like a hipster.
   • 2000, Eugene Davidson, Reflections on a Disruptive Decade: Essays on the Sixties, page 139:

     But it was a white staff member of a reform school who gave Claude Brown the first notion he ever had that there might be something in the world besides dope and sex and hipstering.

   • 2011, Martin Bodek, The Year of Bad Behavior: Bearing Witness to the Uncouthiest of Humanity, →ISBN:

     The hipsters are hipstering, the businessmen are businessing, the parents are parenting, the children are childrening, and the black teenagers are calling each other niggers.

   • 2017, The Rough Guide to the USA, →ISBN:

     If you're up for a night of hipstering, this is a good spot to begin - a grungy joint that nevertheless hosts a solid varying roster of blues, funk, reggae, rock and indie bands.

2. To dress or decorate in a hip fashion.
   • 2009, Jill Malone, A Field Guide to Deception, →ISBN, page 135:

     Claire's permission, to be going out with this fine, circumspect woman, all hipstered out and cowboy booted, without a chaperone.

   • 2014, Tellulah Darling, My Life From Hell, →ISBN:

     I nudged Theo. “I give him three hours before he's hipstered it back up again.

   • 2019, Michael Pryor, Graveyard Shift in Ghost Town, →ISBN:

     Victorian frock coats and neckwear, with facial hair that would make any hipster contemplate giving up hipstering and taking up...

• Pithers, perisht, prehist.

Borrowed from English hipster.

• ^{(aspirated h)} IPA^(key): /ip.stœʁ/

• Audio (France (Lyon)):

  (file)

hipster m or f by sense (plural hipsters)

1. hipster
   • 2024, Alain Damasio, Vallée du silicium, Paris: Seuil, →ISBN, page 119:

     Arnaud Auger a l'âge du Christ, une barbe de hipster ciselée sur un visage en triangle et des yeux bleus sertis dans des lunettes hitech qui lui donnent un air d'intello chic.

     (please add an English translation of this quotation)

• Audio (Germany (Berlin)):

  (file)

hipster

1. inflection of hip:
   1. strong/mixed nominative masculine singular superlative degree
   2. strong genitive/dative feminine singular superlative degree
   3. strong genitive plural superlative degree

Borrowed from English hipster.

• IPA^(key): /ˈxip.stɛr/

• Audio:

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ipstɛr
• Syllabification: hip‧ster

hipster m pers (female equivalent hipsterka)

1. hipster (person interested in the latest trends)
2. hipster (aficionado of jazz who considers himself or herself to be hip)

• hipster in Wielki słownik języka polskiego, Instytut Języka Polskiego PAN
• hipster in Polish dictionaries at PWN

Unadapted borrowing from English hipster.

hipster m or f by sense (plural hipsters)

1. hipster (person interested in the latest trends)

Unadapted borrowing from English hipster.

• IPA^(key): /ˈxibsteɾ/ [ˈxiβ̞s.t̪eɾ]
• Rhymes: -ibsteɾ

hipster m or f by sense (plural hipsters or hipster)

1. hipster

   Synonyms: gafapasta, modernillo

   • 2014 October 28, Ferran Bono, quoting Víctor Lenore, ““Entre los ‘hipsters’, ‘Clandestino’ de Manu Chao fue despreciado””, in El País‎^[3], Madrid, →ISSN:

     Manu Chao es una figura estigmatizada por los hipsters por vulgar.

     (please add an English translation of this quotation)

   • 2021 April 21, Sergio C. Fanjul, “Los ‘punkis’ y la mastina”, in El País‎^[4]:

     Yo creo que Sua ya es más como una hipster treintañera que no puede dárselas de neorrural: ama los coches, teme a las ovejas, ya le vale a la perra – dice Jimena mientras tira fuerte de la correa.

     (please add an English translation of this quotation)

According to Royal Spanish Academy (RAE) prescriptions, unadapted foreign words should be written in italics in a text printed in roman type, and vice versa, and in quotation marks in a manuscript text or when italics are not available. In practice, this RAE prescription is not always followed.

hipster c

1. a hipster (member of a Bohemian counterculture)
2. (historical) a hipster (jazz aficionado)

• hipster in Svensk ordbok (SO)
• hipster in Svenska Akademiens ordlista (SAOL)