Definition of "edgy" in English

adjective

1. Nervous, apprehensive.

2. (entertainment, advertising) Creatively challenging; cutting edge; leading edge.

3. (figurative) On the edge between acceptable and offensive; pushing the boundaries of good taste; risqué.

4. (dated) Irritable.

   • an edgy temper

5. (art) Having some of the forms, such as drapery or the like, too sharply defined.

6. Sharp; having prominent edges.

7. (slang) Cool by virtue of being tough, dark, or badass.

8. (Internet slang) Exhibiting behavior that is disconcerting or alarming, sometimes in an effort to impress or to troll others.

   • These trolls think they’re being satirical and brave because they’re putting these dangerous, edgy so-called jokes on there, but in reality it’s cowardly. It’s the antithesis of bravery because they rarely identify themselves or give away personal information. That’s not courage.
   • A large portion of the Internet audience enjoys edgy content and the behavior of the more extreme users; it wants to see the bad with the good, so it becomes harder to get rid of the ugly. But to attract more mainstream audiences and bring in the big-budget advertisers, you must hide or remove the ugly.
   • At first, trolling was simply an apolitical form of amusement — web posting as performance art. The image board 4chan soon became its mecca. Over time, however, the trolls began moving from joking about racism to advocating it in their desire to become ever more edgy. Andrew Anglin, creator of the neo-Nazi website the Daily Stormer and a longtime troll before that, described the transformation process in a lengthy post on his blog: “The sentiments behind the jokes slowly became serious, as people realized they were based on fact," he wrote. "Non-ironic Nazism [began] masquerading as ironic Nazism.”
   • Dank meme communities love making fun of fidget spinners, especially because spinners are associated with autistic kids, a favorite target for mockery in “edgy” online spaces like 4chan and Reddit. There, spinners are considered emblematic of everything that’s wrong with society, and they’re used as a metaphor for anything unlikeable.