dead website
/dɛd ˈwɛbsaɪt/
CommonA website that no longer functions, has been abandoned, or stopped receiving new content and users.
Not always literally offline. A website can be "dead" while technically still loading if the community or activity around it has completely stopped.
Real-world examples4 examples
| # | Example | What it means | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| 01 | vine is a dead website but i still think about it all the time | A platform that no longer exists still holds cultural significance for the speaker. | x, 2022 |
| 02 | that forum i grew up on is now just a dead website with broken image links | An old online community has become non-functional, with its content degraded. | reddit, 2020 |
| 03 | neopets is genuinely a dead website now and nothing will convince me otherwise | A once-popular site has fallen to the point where the speaker considers it finished. | x, 2023 |
| 04 | clicked on a link from an old reddit thread and it just went to a dead website. 2009 was a different internet | An old link no longer leads anywhere functional, highlighting how much the web has changed. | reddit, 2021 |
Use it when
- Describing a website that no longer has active users or working features.
- Referring to a platform that used to be popular but is now empty or gone.
- Describing a URL that returns an error or an outdated page.
Do not use it when
- You mean a website that was never publicly launched.
- You mean content you can't find because it's been archived but still exists.Use “lost media” instead.
Dead website vs forgotten internet
dead website
Dead website refers to a specific site that is broken, gone, or emptied of users.
VS
forgotten-internet
Forgotten internet refers to the broader landscape of abandoned early web content that still exists but is no longer visited.
Origin and context
Natural internet slang that emerged as websites began shutting down or going dormant in the late 2000s and 2010s. Widespread enough to be used casually across all platforms.
- First seen
- 2000s
- Confidence
- low
Cite this page
Use this stable URL to reference the entry.
https://slang.fyi/dead-websiteUpdated: 2026-08-29License: CC BY 4.0