Word.ws English Dictionary

doomer

Syllables: doom·er/ˈduːmə(ɹ)/

doomer noun: a doom-and-gloomer; a pessimist.

Noun (1)

doomer (plural doomers)

  1. A doom-and-gloomer; a pessimist.
    • I am not normally a pessimist, not by nature one of the doomers of this world whereas Cashem seems to be getting worse and worse. What did he mean by ‘attempt’?2004, Barbara Anderson, Change of Heart, Jonathan Cape, →ISBN, page 132
    • I soon found out it was a common belief among doomers, or people who believe a global catastrophe will happen within the next few years.2015 January 31, Dylan Evans, “I quit my job to set up a post-apocalyptic commune”, in The Guardian, London: Guardian News & Media, →ISSN, →OCLC
    1. One who believes that petroleum depletion will inevitably lead to a severe recession or depression, followed by a Malthusian catastrophe.
      • Those who suggest the likely return of the four horsemen of the apocalypse (famine, pestilence, war, and death) are more vocal than ever before despite being labeled Malthusian or just "doomer."2009, David Holmgren, Future Scenarios, Chelsea Green
      • There is an ever louder babble of apocalypse-predicting subcultures, amplified and partly sustained by the internet: peak-oil doomers, who believe the world's energy supplies will collapse and mass famine will follow; […].2011 December 18, Andy Beckett, “The news is terrible. Is the world really doomed?”, in Alan Rusbridger, editor, The Guardian, London: Guardian News & Media, →ISSN, →OCLC
    2. (capitalized, neologism, sometimes) Someone who is apathetic or has a negative prospect towards the world.
      • Doomers, meanwhile, are the nihilistic cousins of "Bloomers" and "Gloomers," all three gradients of the same 20-something. Whereas Bloomers are well adjusted and Gloomers are depressed because they are not, Doomers have simply stopped trying. They are no longer pursuing friendships or...2020 February 3, Kaitlyn Tiffany, “The Misogynistic Joke that Became a Goth-meme Fairy Tale”, in Jeffrey Goldberg, editor, The Atlantic, Washington, D.C.: The Atlantic Monthly Group, →ISSN, →OCLC
      • Tim Joung, a 20-year-old student in New York, agrees with almost everything that so-called doomers believe: individual action makes little difference, and unscrupulous corporations are at fault for climate change.2020 September 21, Alexandra Villarreal, “Meet the doomers: why some young US voters have given up hope on climate”, in Katharine Viner, editor, The Guardian, London: Guardian News & Media, →ISSN...
    3. A techno-pessimist, in particular concerning artificial intelligence.
      • To this day, some doomers work on the inside, nudging the big A.I. labs toward caution, and some work on the outside, arguing that the big A.I. labs should not exist.2024 March 18, Andrew Marantz, “О.К., Doomer”, in The New Yorker, New York, N.Y.: Condé Nast Publications, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 47
      • Today [Eliezer] Yudkowsky is regarded as a leader of the “doomers”, a faction whose members believe that superintelligent AI will be unambiguously bad for humanity and perhaps even cause our extinction.2025 March 5, J. Oliver Conroy, “They wanted to save us from a dark AI future. Then six people were killed”, in Katharine Viner, editor, The Guardian, London: Guardian News & Media, →ISSN, →OCLC
  2. (archaic, rare) One who, or that which, dooms, or pronounces a sentence; a judge.
    • Are not the heauens doomers of mens deedes?1590, T[homas] L[odge], “Saladyne”, in Rosalynde. Euphues Golden Legacie: […], London: […] Thomas Orwin for T. G[ubbin] and John Busbie, →OCLC, folio 26, recto
    • That fatal look of a common intelligence, of a common assent, was exchanged among the doomers of the prisoner's life and death, as the judge concluded.1869, Edward Bulwer Lytton, Prose Works

Noun (2) capitalized: Doomer

Doomer (plural Doomers)

  1. (informal) A player of the video game Doom.
    • Doomers, ranging from children to senior citizens, are up all night hunting specters, imps, and other hellspawn, battling each other in so-called Deathmatch tournaments, and checking out the latest Doom lore by conversing with the game’s developers over computer chat lines. […] What’s ahead for...1994, BusinessWeek, page 16
    • I am not a female Doomer, but I did "catch" my fiance playing Doom the other day. It led us to a discussion of why ID didn't put the option in to choose a female character.1994 April 30, Ricardo Lopez, “Are there any *female* doomers out there?”, in alt.games.doom (Usenet)
  2. Alternative letter-case form of doomer.

Noun (3) capitalized: DOOMer

DOOMer (plural DOOMers)

  1. Alternative letter-case form of Doomer (“player of DOOM”).
    • Along with many, many other places where DOOMers frequent. […] NOTE DMCL Distribution Please feel free to distribute the list to anywhere the DOOMers may be.1994, Robert Waring, DOOM: Totally Unauthorized Tips & Secrets, Brady Publishing, →ISBN, page 115
    • “Using a combination of our own warped imaginations, thousands of hours of software development, and insightful suggestions from thousands of dedicated DOOMers worldwide, we’ve crafted a sequel that is more exciting, more deadly, and even more realistic than the original DOOM,” says id Software CEO...1995 February 18, Chris McGowan, “CD-ROM Successes: How They Happen”, in Billboard, page 75

Examples of doomer in a sentence

  • […] while a Minnesotan in her early thirties summed up the general influence of apocalyptic popular culture: “I think it has made me more of a doomer. […]2015, Matthew Schneider-Mayerson, Peak Oil: Apocalyptic Environmentalism and Libertarian Political Culture, page 114:
  • Doomers, meanwhile, are the nihilistic cousins of "Bloomers" and "Gloomers," all three gradients of the same 20-something.2020 February 3, Kaitlyn Tiffany, “The Misogynistic Joke that Became a Goth-meme Fairy Tale”, in Jeffrey Goldberg, editor, The Atlantic...
  • She added, perhaps to the chagrin of the AI doomers in the crowd: "This is not a trial on the safety risks of artificial intelligence."2026 May 9, Dara Kerr, “What I saw at the Musk-OpenAI trial: petty billionaires, protests and a stern judge”, in Katharine Viner, editor...

Antonyms of doomer

Forms of doomer

pluraldoomers
pluralDoomers
pluralDOOMers

Origin of doomer

From Middle English domere, from Old English dōmere (“judge”), equivalent to doom + -er. The more recent sense was popularized via a meme, “30 Year-Old Boomer” (first posted in April 2018), the derivations of which are other words that end in -oomer, describing various personality types.

From Doom + -er.

From DOOM + -er.

Words formed from doomer

Words that rhyme with doomer

4 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about doomer

What does doomer mean?
Doomer means a doom-and-gloomer; a pessimist.
How do you use doomer in a sentence?
[…] while a Minnesotan in her early thirties summed up the general influence of apocalyptic popular culture: “I think it has made me more of a doomer. […]
What part of speech is doomer?
Doomer is a noun.
How do you pronounce doomer?
Doomer is pronounced /ˈduːmə(ɹ)/.
What is the plural of doomer?
The plural of doomer is doomers.

Words near doomer in the dictionary

  1. doomcore
  2. doome
  3. doomed
  4. doomed if you do, doomed if you don't
  5. doomedness
  6. doomer
  7. doomerism
  8. doomerisms
  9. doomerist
  10. doomerists
  11. doomers

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: doomer (page history and authors); Doomer (page history and authors); DOOMer (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: En-us-doomer.oga.

Cite this entry: “doomer.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/doomer. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.