NEED TO KNOW
- A viral TikTok exchange about a New Year’s resolution involving 365 buttons has confused the internet — and birthed an iconic catchphrase
- TikTok user “Tamara” mysteriously said she was “getting 365 buttons” in 2026 to encourage her to “do more stuff,” but refused to explain when pressed for more details
- Her quote — “hey so it actually only has to make sense to me for me to do it and I don’t feel like explaining it to anyone else” — has since gone viral
In for 2026: 365 buttons. Out for 2026: Explaining yourself.
In the early days of the new year, a viral meme, unwittingly started by a user simply named “Tamara,” has taken over TikTok. And it all has to do with a thread of comments from a December TikTok post, where Tamara mysteriously said she was “getting 365 buttons” in 2026 to encourage her to “do more stuff” — but when pressed for more details about how said buttons would aid her in said resolution, she refused to explain.
Naturally, the rest of the internet is now dying to get to the bottom of the “365 buttons” mystery, and Tamara’s refusal to explain herself has become a viral catchphrase for those adopting a nonchalant attitude heading into 2026.
Here’s everything you need to know about the “365 buttons” meme.
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Where did the ‘365 buttons’ meme originate?
It all began with a TikTok video — posted by user @abbieabbieabbie0 — on Dec. 21. The video itself was fairly innocuous: Abbie, sitting in her bed with a facemask and her hair wrapped, lip-synced to an audio from The Devil Wears Prada. “How serious I’m taking this 2026 rebrand,” she overlaid the video with pink text.
In a string of since-deleted comments — but thankfully memorialized in screen recordings later uploaded by other users — Tamara offered her own method to stay present in the new year.
“I’m getting 365 buttons one for each day because I want to do more stuff and I’m scared of time so I want to be more conscious of it,” she wrote — evidently generating a great deal of confusion among other commenters.
“What is 365 buttons,” responded a user named Sophia.
“One for every day,” Tamara simply replied.
“Yes queen but wdym buttons? Like to wear?” user Jaiden chimed in.
Tamara evaded the question, instead responding: “just to have to see how quick days pass and to remind myself that time passes and I just have fun and to do a lot of stuff.”
“What are you doing with the buttons everyday is what they’re asking. Are you putting them in a jar, are you wearing them??” a third user asked.
And then Tarama gave her iconic line: “hey so it actually only has to make sense to me for me to do it and I don’t feel like explaining it to anyone else.” And thus, a meme was born.
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What does the ‘365 buttons’ meme mean?
Nobody knows — seemingly not even Tamara.
Even after Tamara insisted she didn’t have to explain her 2026 button plans, one TikTok user still wouldn’t stop trying to get more details out of her, writing that people probably were just trying to understand her intentions to “get ideas to help themselves.”
But Tamara continued to dig in: “I don’t know and I don’t have to know okay I just want to carry around a button everyday,” she wrote.
While it may remain unclear how Tamara plans to use her 365 buttons, her quote — “hey so it only has to make sense for me” — has had a life of its own. It has been edited with Charli xcx’s Brat font, used in ethereal vlog montages, and has generally become a motto in the new year.
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How has the ‘365 buttons’ meme caught on?
Everyone is getting in on the trend.
On Jan. 1, Tumblr declared 2026 the “year of 365 buttons” in a post on X.
On the Philadelphia Eagles’ official TikTok account, the team uploaded a video with a large box of (presumably 365) buttons and overlaid the text, “Alright Tamara, now what?”
And perhaps goofiest of all, an indie bluegrass band Karma Creek uploaded a new song they wrote to TikTok, using lines from Tamara’s comment exchange.
Tamara, however, has remained elusive. (She did not respond to PEOPLE’s request for comment.)
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