Mic Drop – Origin, Meaning & Sentence Examples

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Danielle McLeod

Danielle McLeod is a highly qualified secondary English Language Arts Instructor who brings a diverse educational background to her classroom. With degrees in science, English, and literacy, she has worked to create cross-curricular materials to bridge learning gaps and help students focus on effective writing and speech techniques. Currently working as a dual credit technical writing instructor at a Career and Technical Education Center, her curriculum development surrounds student focus on effective communication for future career choices.

American English uses a lot of figurative phrases to add creative tone and emphasis to writing and speech. Unfortunately, to fully appreciate their use, the audience needs to have some knowledge of their influences or origins to make a connection between the words and the message the author wishes to portray.

Using the expression mic drop figuratively is fairly modern and is both a physical action (physical and feigned) and a saying to emphasize a message. If you’ve heard or seen it in action, it is generally self-explanatory, but you might not know its origins or how to use it in a sentence properly.

Below, we explore its meaning and interesting history.

What Does Mic Drop Mean?

Mic Drop Origin Meaning Sentence Examples

In a literal sense, mic drop means to drop the microphone and was the influence behind the figurative use and action – either by a speaker or musician. At first, the physical act was often done in anger or to tease the crowd into thinking the microphone may fall during a performance.

Today, a mic drop is an act of deliberately dropping a microphone at the end of a performance that the performer deems to be extremely impressive or unable to be surpassed. It is used to “brag” or claim through the action that their act is the best or that they’ve had the last word.

For example:

  • At the end of the set, the crowd was roaring their approval; a grin split his face as he dropped the mic and sauntered off stage to the cries of an encore.
  • It was a mic-drop moment as her eyes met the faces of the inquiring journalist as she stepped from the car, holding her head high and emerging in an exquisite gown.

It also can be used as a spoken phrase or feigned by holding your arm straight out with a downwards fist that you open deliberately – as if you were dropping the mic.

For example:

  • After explaining to the class that anyone failing at the quarter’s end would be in danger of not graduating, she held out her hand, fist down, and “dropped the mic.” The students got the point, and late work began to appear on her desk the following day.

Mic drop is an abbreviation of microphone drop, which is why mic is spelled with a “c.” When used as an adjective before a noun, it is hyphenated, as in mic-drop.

What Is the Significance of Dropping the Mic?

Mic Drop Origin Meaning Sentence Examples 1

A mic drop acts as a punctuation when an impressive performance is given or an impressive point is made. It is not limited to stage performers either and is commonly used in informal speech and debate and amongst friends to draw further attention to what they’ve said. It is generally used to highlight an important point and signify that the conversation or speech is over.

For example:

  • As the debate ended, it was obvious who had won, and a lone voice in the audience yelled out, “mic drop!” over the sound of applause.

Origins of Mic Drop

Mic Drop Ngram
Mic Drop Usage Trend.

The idea of the literal mic drop has been around since the 1950s when certain performers would “rock” the microphone stand or move it to make it look like it was falling. They would then reach out and pull it back to them. James Brown often used this move while on stage after “rescuing” a falling microphone and using the happy accident as a signature event while performing.

In 1978 Johnny Rotten of the Sex Pistols announced on stage that he felt cheated out of their performance and purposely dropped the mic before turning and walking off stage. This was the last time the group would perform together until a reunion tour in 1996. Essentially, he may have had the first verifiable mic drop in history, during which his actions emphasized that nothing more was to be said.

The action became mainstream in the 1980s when Eddie Murphy began to tie the action into his comedy skits, turning it from something that originated with anger into something funny. Rappers through the 80s and 90s also often dropped the mic during rap battles to indicate their superior skills after finishing a set.

And more recently, we’ve even seen politicians use it lightheartedly when discussing serious matters to help avoid high tensions.

The term mic drop was added to the Oxford English Dictionary in 2015.

Let’s Review

The figurative use of dropping the mic can be both a physical and spoken action. It is a way to emphasize to your audience that you are finished, you are superior, and to figuratively offer a challenge to those who think, but most likely can’t, provide superior performance.