Newbie, newb, noob, noobie, n00b or nub is a

slang Slang is vocabulary (words, phrases, and linguistic usages) of an informal register, common in spoken conversation but avoided in formal writing. It also sometimes refers to the language generally exclusive to the members of particular in-gro ...

term for a

novice A novice is a person who has entered a religious order and is under probation, before taking vows. A ''novice'' can also refer to a person (or animal e.g. racehorse) who is entering a profession A profession is a field of work that has ...

newcomer Newcomer may refer to: * Newcomer (surname) * Newcomer (Lenape), chief of the western Lenape and founder of Newcomerstown, Ohio * Newcomer, Missouri, a community in the United States * Novichok agent, ''Novichok'' meaning 'Newcomer' in Russian la ...

, or somebody inexperienced in a profession or activity. Contemporary use can particularly refer to a beginner or new user of computers, often concerning

Internet The Internet (or internet) is the global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to communicate between networks and devices. It is a '' network of networks'' that consists of private, pub ...

activity, such as online gaming or

Linux Linux ( or ) is a family of open-source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991, by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged as a Linux distribution, which ...

use. The origin of this term is uncertain. Earliest uses probably date to late twentieth century

United States Armed Forces The United States Armed Forces are the military forces of the United States. The armed forces consists of six service branches: the Army, Marine Corps, Navy, Air Force, Space Force, and Coast Guard. The president of the United States is the ...

jargon Jargon is the specialized terminology associated with a particular field or area of activity. Jargon is normally employed in a particular Context (language use), communicative context and may not be well understood outside that context. The conte ...

, though possible precursor terms are much earlier. Variant forms of the noun include newby and newbie, while the related term noob (often stylized as "n00b") is often used in online gaming.

History

Etymology of the term is uncertain. It may derive from "newie", which is attested in U.S. and Australian sources of the 1850s, meaning a neophyte in a place or situation; alternatively, it may derive from the British

public school Public school may refer to: * State school (known as a public school in many countries), a no-fee school, publicly funded and operated by the government * Public school (United Kingdom), certain elite fee-charging independent schools in England an ...

slang "new boy" or "new blood", which is attributed to the same era and was applied to a schoolboy in his first term.newbie
''The Oxford English Dictionary'', 2nd ed., 1989, ''OED Online'', Oxford University Press, (subscription needed) March 8, 2010. In the 1960s and 1970s, the term "newbie" had a limited usage among U.S. troops in the

Vietnam War The Vietnam War (also known by #Names, other names) was a conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. It was the second of the Indochina Wars and was officially fought between North Vie ...

as a slang term for a new man in a unit. Another use of the term newbee was the moniker given to new U.S. Navy recruit students attending Basic Electricity and Electronics school by more senior students, a requisite course prior to enrollment in the A-school course at Naval Air Technical Training Center, Millington, Tennessee. Its earliest known usage on an internet may have been on the

Usenet Usenet () is a worldwide distributed discussion system available on computers. It was developed from the general-purpose Unix-to-Unix Copy (UUCP) dial-up network architecture. Tom Truscott and Jim Ellis conceived the idea in 1979, and it was ...

newsgroup ''talk.bizarre''. The term is believed to have entered online usage by 1981. Coming from an oral tradition, the term has various spellings. Among alternative forms are "newby", "nubie", and "newbee" (e.g. ''

Los Angeles Times The ''Los Angeles Times'' (abbreviated as ''LA Times'') is a daily newspaper that started publishing in Los Angeles in 1881. Based in the LA-adjacent suburb of El Segundo since 2018, it is the sixth-largest newspaper by circulation in the Un ...

'' of August 1985: "It had to do with newbees. I could be wrong on the spelling, but newbies are the rookies among the Blue Angels."). In 2000,

Electronic Arts Electronic Arts Inc. (EA) is an American video game company headquartered in Redwood City, California. Founded in May 1982 by Apple employee Trip Hawkins, the company was a pioneer of the early home computer game industry and promoted the d ...

released The Sims. The game featured a tutorial house with a family called The Newbies. In 2009, "noob" was among candidates for the one-millionth English word selection by the

Global Language Monitor The Global Language Monitor (GLM) is a company based in Austin, Texas that collectively documents, analyzes, and tracks trends in language usage worldwide, with a particular emphasis upon the English language. It is particularly known for its ...

Connotations of variants

Different spellings can have quite different connotations; so in some contexts a "newb" refers to a beginner who is willing to learn, while a " noob" refers disparagingly to an inexperienced or under-talented hacker or gamer who lacks the determination to learn.

Similar terms in other languages

* In Korean, the equivalent term is ''

chobo Newbie, newb, noob, noobie, n00b or nub is a slang term for a novice or newcomer, or somebody inexperienced in a profession or activity. Contemporary use can particularly refer to a beginner or new user of computers, often concerning Internet ac ...

'' or ''hasu'', the opposite of ''

gosu Gosu (고수) is a Korean term used to refer to a highly skilled person. In computer gaming the term is usually used to refer to a person who dominated games like ''StarCraft'', ''Counter-Strike'', Tekken, ''Warcraft III'', ''Diablo II ''D ...

'', meaning "highly skilled". * In

Chinese Chinese can refer to: * Something related to China * Chinese people, people of Chinese nationality, citizenship, and/or ethnicity **''Zhonghua minzu'', the supra-ethnic concept of the Chinese nation ** List of ethnic groups in China, people of va ...

, ''

cainiao Cainiao Smart Logistics Network Limited (), formerly known as China Smart Logistics Network, is a Chinese logistics company launched by Alibaba Group, jointly with eight other companies, on 28 May 2013. As of May 2018, Cainiao was one of the la ...

'' (). It either originated from

Hong Kong Hong Kong ( (US) or (UK); , ), officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China ( abbr. Hong Kong SAR or HKSAR), is a city and special administrative region of China on the eastern Pearl River Delt ...

or from the Taiwanese army. It became an Internet slang term used in the Chinese-speaking community.

Notes

References

External links