6 Cuffing Season Trends to Know This Winter

Cuffing season has been a thing for long enough that you might wonder whether it is, in fact, still a thing. But while internet trends tend to come and go, cuffing season—the time of year during the fall/winter months when daters are supposedly more eager and likely to get into a relationship—has remained remarkably relevant over the 10-plus years since it first entered the dating zeitgeist. If anything, cuffing season’s lore only continues to grow each year, with new cuffing-related terms and trends popping up as the cuffing season universe continues to evolve.

As we head into the thick of this annual dating tradition, here’s your guide to some of the most prominent new cuffing-adjacent terms, trends, and offshoots. Because at this point, cuffing season basically has its own language.

While the exact cuffing season timeline is somewhat up for debate/interpretation, the schedule is often compared to that of football season: beginning in late summer/early fall and culminating with the “Superbowl” (Valentine’s Day) in February. The “drafting” period generally refers to the earliest part of cuffing season, when aspiring cuffers may still be dating multiple people before narrowing their rosters down to the top contenders.

While drafting is sometimes considered a cuffing season trend in its own right (and an arguably “toxic” one, with some arguing this practice/language feeds into a gamified and ultimately dehumanizing dating culture), it may also simply refer to this period of time early on in the cuffing season schedule and not necessarily to any specific dating behaviors.

While drafting is often considered the first phase of cuffing season, some cuffing enthusiasts argue that things actually kick off even earlier with the “scouting” period. Per a TikTok outlining the official Gen Z cuffing season timeline, the scouting phase begins as early as August and involves collecting “prospects” before the drafting phase begins in September, which is when daters begin “testing the waters.”

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An alternative to cuffing that encourages would-be cuffers to slow down and approach cuffing season with a more open-minded, “let’s just see where this goes” mindset, as opposed to rushing into a relationship. Per Vice, “leafing” gets its name “from the trees’ annual shedding of their leaves” and is “all about slowing down, letting go, and allowing things to fall into place naturally.”

A variant of cuffing, “sledging” refers to getting into a cuffing season relationship with the intention of breaking things off by spring. It’s generally considered a more toxic approach to cuffing season due to the fact that the other person—the one “getting sledged”—has likely not been made aware that this romance has an expiration date. The name itself comes from the act of dragging a literal “sledge” (AKA sled), through the snow, the implication being that the sledger is just dragging someone along/leading them on through the winter, with little to no intention of actually trying to forge a real relationship.

Similar to sledging, “snowmanning” refers to getting into a cuffing season relationship for the winter and breaking things off by spring/summer. Unlike sledging, however, snowmanning is thought to be less intentional and therefore generally considered less toxic. Essentially, while a sledger is thought to go into a cuffing season relationship with the (undisclosed) intention of keeping it a short-term seasonal fling, snowmanning is simply realizing your relationship may have been more about wanting to cuddle up with someone for the winter than actually finding a long-term partner. By spring, the relationship has run its course and “melts away” with the warm weather like a snowman, hence the name.

“Winter coating” refers to getting back together with an ex during cuffing season, presumably more out of the urge to avoid wintertime boredom or being alone for the holidays than a genuine desire to rekindle a relationship. Like sledging, winter coating results in a temporary fling that will likely end when cuffing season does—regardless of whether either party involved is actually aware of/willing to acknowledge that reality. The name refers to using someone for comfort during the cold winter months (i.e., putting them on like a winter coat) and shedding them in the spring when (again, like a coat) you no longer need them. Back in the closet they go till next winter!

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