viral

/ˈvaɪɹəl/

viral adjective: of or relating to a biological virus.

Adjective

viral (not comparable)

Of or relating to a biological virus.
- viral DNA
Caused by a virus.
- viral infection
Of the nature of an informatic virus; able to spread copies of itself to other computers.
Spread by word of mouth with minimal intervention, in order to create buzz and interest.
- “Efficient way to disseminate information? I don't think.”
  “But it is,” Cayce insists. “The model's viral. ‘Deep niche.’ The venues would be carefully selected—”2003, William Gibson, Pattern Recognition (Bigend cycle; book 1), New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons, →ISBN, page 85
- Still, the movie [Ralph Breaks the Internet] manages to locate some gentle satire in our culture's love-hate relationship with the internet. At one point, Ralph must attain a certain level of viral popularity, assisted by the BuzzFeed-esque content guru Yesss (Taraji P. Henson), and the movie is...2018 November 14, Jesse Hassenger, “Disney Goes Viral with an Ambitious, Overstuffed Wreck-It Ralph Sequel”, in The A.V. Club, archived from the original on 21 Nov 2019
(social media) Circulated rapidly and widely from one user to another.
- With some minutes to kill, he checks the headlines on his phone. Yet again, something dreadful and new which he doesn't understand is going viral. Today's fad is, you paint a black vertical rectangle on the wall, or on a mirror, or over the top of a picture. And then you chant something.2019 April 10, qntm, “CASE HATE RED”, in There Is No Antimemetics Division, →ISBN, page 135
- The end game of that is the GoFundMe link posted beneath a viral tweet so they can pay for their health care. Being an influencer sounds fun until it’s ‘keep producing viral content to literally stay alive.’2021 March 24, Charlie Warzel, quoting Anil Dash, “What Are You Paying for When You Buy a GIF for $25,000?”, in The New York Times, →ISSN

Noun

viral (plural virals)

A video, image or text spread by "word of mouth" on the internet or by e-mail for humorous, political or marketing purposes.
- Using the Flash ActiveX control in this way allows you as a developer to create desktop characters, email virals and screensavers.2002, Nik Lever, Flash Mx Games: ActionScript for Artists, Focal Press, page 411
- [M]ost virals are not seen as profiling and data collection exercises, since that would kill the impulse of forwarding to a friend.2003, Dave Chaffey, Total E-Mail Marketing, Elsevier, page 2

viral meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Marathi and Urdu

viral in Hindi

(of an image, video, piece of information, etc.) circulating rapidly and widely from one Internet user to another: वायरल vāyral, व्यापक vyāpak

viral in Tamil

நச்சுநுண்மம் சார்ந்த, நச்சுயிரி சார்ந்த, நச்சுயிரி பாதிப்பால், அதிநுண்ணுயிரால், பம்பல், பம்பி

viral in Marathi

व्हायरल

viral in Urdu

سم آلود, زہریلے مادے کا

More languagesFewer languages

viral in Bengali: বিষপূর্ণ, বিষাক্ত, দূষিত, দুষ্ট
viral in Telugu: వైరల్
viral in Malayalam: വൈറൽ, വൈറലായി
viral in Kannada: ವೈರಲ್
viral in Punjabi: ਵਾਇਰਲ
viral in Gujarati: વાયરલ
viral in Odia: ଭାଇରାଲ
viral in Nepali: भाइरल
viral in Malay: virus, tular

Examples of viral in a sentence

He posted a meme that went viral within a few hours on social media.
Not much virus was detectable on a nucleic acid test; the viral load was very low.
After the painting was defaced a decade ago, it went viral and has been a tourist attraction ever since.

All 40 example sentences with viral

Synonyms of viral

virous

Forms of viral

plural	virals

Origin of viral

From virus + -al.

Phrases with viral

Words that rhyme with viral

Questions about viral

What does viral mean?: Viral means of or relating to a biological virus.
What is viral in Hindi?: Viral in Hindi is वायरल (vāyral), व्यापक (vyāpak). See Viral meaning in Hindi.
What part of speech is viral?: Viral can be an adjective or a noun.
How do you pronounce viral?: Viral is pronounced /ˈvaɪɹəl/.

Words near viral in the dictionary

Adapted from Wiktionary: viral (page history and authors); viral (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); viral (Marathi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); viral (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); viral (Bengali Wiktionary) (page history and authors); viral (Telugu, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); viral (Malayalam, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); viral (Kannada, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); viral (Punjabi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); viral (Gujarati, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); viral (Odia, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); viral (Nepali, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license). 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: 2026-09-02

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-viral.wav.

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