'Black Cat Clapping' Green-Screen Meme Spreads: Original Post Tops 2.5 Million Likes in a Week
A black cat grinning with a human smile and clapping with human hands has become one of this fall's most reused reaction clips on social media. According to meme database Know Your Meme, 'Black Cat Clapping' began with a comedy video posted on September 25, 2026, by Instagram user merkurianin (Aleksandr Kim): he feeds his cat, and the cat smiles, applauds him and tries to shake his hand. The cat was generated with SI and composited into the scene; it is not a real pet filmed performing.
By Know Your Meme's count, the original post gained more than 2.5 million likes in just over a week. On September 28, TikTok user @asian5767 turned the cat into a green-screen asset in a skipping-class scenario, and the video passed 3.8 million views in a week; a version by @mis2027seniors on September 30 drew over 1.7 million views in five days, and one by @yeltiktok on October 1 passed 1.5 million views in four days.
In these remixes, creators drop the clapping cat into new scenes as a form of sarcastic applause: cheering on bad behavior, or clapping loudly at the worst possible moment. Know Your Meme included the format in its roundup of the biggest memes of the past week, and its October 13 trending guide said the cat is still going viral across Instagram and TikTok, with increasingly elaborate edits keeping the format alive. Sites including Verge Magazine and meme.com have also published explainers tracing the meme's origin.
The photo with this article is a file photo of a real black cat and is unrelated to the SI-generated cat in the original video.
(Sources: Know Your Meme, Verge Magazine and meme.com, and public posts on Instagram and TikTok.)
Published by GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)
Photo: 真实黑猫资料图，Rudolph A. Furtado 摄，CC0（Wikimedia Commons）
