Rizz up means to flirt with charisma to attract someone romantically. "He rizzed her up" = he flirted skillfully and got her attention. Slight evolution of "rizz." Not concerning, just teen flirting vocabulary. If your kid uses it constantly, ask them where they first heard it, not to police their speech but to understand which online community they are in. Most slang of this kind moves through TikTok and group chats, so seeing it in your child's vocabulary just means they are plugged into normal teen internet culture.
rizz up
To flirt with and charm someone — the verb form of rizz.
rɪz ʌpDocumented since 2010s2010sGen AlphatrendingFading183 viewsLast reviewed Jun 29, 2026＋ Add a definition
Etymology timeline
Born ~2018 · 1 year of recorded useSeen in the wild
Twitter / XDec 2023
The nuance Cenat insists on has now gradually ebbed away from the way most people use the term “rizz,” so that it’s become a lot closer to the way we used to use the word “game.” De Tolla assures me that these days, y…
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Firecrawl: Rizz named word of the year 2023 by Oxford University Press - BBC
The term is thought to be a shortened form of the word "charisma". - [AI named word of the year by Collins Dictionary](https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-67271252) - [What's Merriam-Webster's new word of th…
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Definitions
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#1·Apr 24, 2026US-BLACK
To flirt with and charm someone — the verb form of rizz. "He rizzed her up at the bar" = he successfully chatted her up. Implies smooth confidence; a failed rizz-up is its own subgenre of self-roasting text messages to the group chat.
See it in action
“The nuance Cenat insists on has now gradually ebbed away from the way most people use the term “rizz,” so that it’s become a lot closer to the way we used to use the word “game.” De Tolla assures me that these days, you can rizz up someone who is in your league just as well as you can someone out of your league.”
"Spent 10 minutes trying to rizz her up. She's got a boyfriend."
Origin: Dating / app-era coinage, popularized on TikTok and in lifestyle journalism, 2018–2024.
For parents
Rizz up means to flirt with charisma to attract someone romantically. "He rizzed her up" = he flirted skillfully and got her attention. Slight evolution of "rizz." Not concerning, just teen flirting vocabulary. If your kid uses it constantly, ask them where they first heard it, not to police their speech but to understand which online community they are in. Most slang of this kind moves through TikTok and group chats, so seeing it in your child's vocabulary just means they are plugged into normal teen internet culture.
For ESL learners
Rizz up is the verb form of the Gen Z noun "rizz" (charisma in flirting), meaning to actively flirt and impress someone. Use only in casual speech and social media. Formal equivalent: "to charm," "to flirt successfully with." Common non-native mistake: using it in formal or professional contexts where it sounds juvenile. Often paired with "up" as a phrasal verb. Read or listen to the word in context several times before trying it yourself; the right register is harder to learn than the dictionary meaning.
Cluster: flirt
Heard in the wild
“The nuance Cenat insists on has now gradually ebbed away from the way most people use the term “rizz,” so that it’s become a lot closer to the way we used to use the word “game.” De Tolla assures me that these days, you can rizz up someone who is in your league just as well as you can someone out of your league.”
“The term is thought to be a shortened form of the word "charisma". - [AI named word of the year by Collins Dictionary](https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-67271252) - [What's Merriam-Webster's new word of the year?](https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-67543895) It can also be used as a verb, in sayings such as "to rizz up", which means to attract, seduce, or chat someone up.”
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Show 1 more dictionary-style sense (imported)
US-BLACK
#2·May 2, 2026US-BLACK
To seduce a love interest; to attract someone using rizz.
Source: Wiktionary (CC BY-SA 4.0)
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For specific readers
Why is this section here?
Slang is read by different audiences for very different reasons. The For parents view re-explains the term in plain, non-judgemental language so a caregiver can understand what their child means without needing the surrounding subculture. The For English learners view focuses on register (when it's safe to use), formal alternatives, and common mistakes — what a textbook won't teach you.
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💘About Relationships & Dating slang
How people talk about dating apps, modern romance, and the situationships they swear they're over — from ghosting and breadcrumbing to soft-launching, hard-launching, and the ick.
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Semantically related
- rizz90%
Verb form: to "rizz someone up" is to flirt with them successfully. Inflected freely — rizzed, rizzing, rizzy.
- rizz83%
Charisma, charm, or the ability to attract a romantic partner through smooth talk and confident energy. Used as a noun ("he has rizz") or verb ("rizzing her up").
- rizz79%
The effortless ability to flirt. Subcategories include "unspoken rizz" (you don't even talk, they're already into you) and "W rizz" (winning).
- rizz78%
A social-stock metaphor: someone's "rizz stock" rises and falls in real time with every interaction — like an aura score, but purely for dating charisma.