What Does "Opp" Mean?
An enemy or rival — someone you are actively on bad terms with, most often used in the plural.
Not to be confused with: OPP as an acronym in business or policing, and the 1991 Naughty by Nature song of the same name, which uses the letters to mean something entirely different. The slang sense is always short for opposition.
Opp Meaning, Explained
Opp is short for opposition. In its original context it is serious — it names people you are genuinely in conflict with, and it carries the weight of the drill scene it came from. In general teenage use it has been drained almost completely: the opps are now a rival football team, a sibling who took the last biscuit, or a teacher who set homework over a holiday. Both registers are in circulation at the same time, and the gap between them is wide. It is worth being aware that when the word appears in music or in reporting about violence it is not being used lightly, even though the version most people encounter is entirely a joke.
How to Use Opp in a Sentence
These are representative sentences showing how the term is used in each place, written for this page — not quotations from specific posts.
-
“The vending machine is my opp, it ate my money again.”
The fully drained sense. Applied to an object, it just means something is being annoying.
-
“sat next to the opps at the match, worst decision of my life”
Rival supporters. Sport is one of the most common contexts for the softened plural.
-
“My little brother is an opp for telling mum.”
Family use, entirely joking. The word's original weight is completely absent here.
-
“People forget opps means something real in the music it came from.”
A regular reminder in discussions of the word, pointing at the distance between its two registers.
Where "Opp" Came From
Opp is a shortening of opposition, and it comes from African American Vernacular English by way of drill music. It became widely audible through the Chicago drill scene from around 2012 and then through UK drill later in the decade, where references to opps are a standard feature of the form. In those contexts the word describes real rivalries. Its move into general slang happened through the music's mainstream audience, and in that transfer the meaning softened dramatically, ending up as a light word for anyone you are annoyed with. Merriam-Webster documents the plural form.
How confident is this? The AAVE and drill route is well established, but the 2012 date reflects when the word becomes audible in Chicago drill rather than a documented first use. Shortenings like this typically circulate in speech well before they appear in a recording.
Sources: merriam-webster.com · slanginsights.com
Decode Your Own Message
A definition only helps if you already knew which word to look up. Paste in the whole message instead — every term from this dictionary gets swapped for plain English, including the ones you did not spot.
In plain English
my brother is an [rival] for telling mum, that's [suspicious] behaviour [no lie]
Terms found
- Opp — An enemy or rival — someone you are actively on bad terms with, most often used in the plural.
- Sus — Suspicious or not quite right — used about a person, a story, a link, a price or a whole situation.
- No cap — No exaggeration, I am telling the truth — and "cap" on its own means a lie or a boast.
No slang from this dictionary found in that message yet.
Want it the other way round? Rewrite your own text in the same style.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is calling someone an opp serious?
It depends entirely on context. In drill music and reporting on real conflict it names genuine enemies. In everyday teenage speech it means someone mildly annoying.
Where does opp come from?
It is short for opposition, from African American Vernacular English, and became widely heard through Chicago drill music from around 2012 and later UK drill.
Why is it usually plural?
Because the original sense described a rival group rather than one person. "The opps" stayed the standard form even as the meaning softened.
Is opp still used in 2026?
Yes, in both registers. The joking use is far more common in general conversation, while the serious one remains in the music it came from.
Last reviewed 2026-07-31. 532 words of entry-specific content.