This is the age of maximisation: maximising looks, maximising the lucre, maximising social biome, maximising brownie points, or maximising what we are not. This maximising mentality is so ubiquitous that Dictionary.com has declared Maxxing the word of the year 2026. Addition of an extra X – not to please Elon Musk – in the word is reflective of going no-holds-barred on whatever activity we get involved in.

The suffix has roots in the gamification term, min-maxxing -- a gaming strategy wherein players maximise useful attributes and minimise weaknesses to create the most effective character. In October 2025, Nitsuh Abebe wrote an article, 'The Suffix That Tells Us to Ruthlessly Optimise Everything' and traced the origin or over-use of this suffix in video gaming: "It's how we got maxxing of just any personal quality, as if spending points in a video game skills tree."

Maxxing is the digital world's slang suffix, hence written as -maxxing, which means 'optimising one part of your life as far as it will go.' It is also reserved for describing Gen........

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