The "How Hungry" meme originated on Twitter in 2020 and gained popularity from a tweet where a person says "man I'm so hungry," and a horse nervously responds, "how hungry?" This is a play on the phrase "I'm so hungry, I could eat a horse," with the horse character reacting anxiously about potentially being eaten. Later, this concept was turned into a three-panel comic featuring the horse giving an intensely confident stare, which became a meme template that people widely edited and shared with different characters and variations. The meme's humor centers around the horse's reaction and the exaggerated interpretation of hunger.
This meme has since been remixed and exploited for various humorous versions, extending beyond just the horse to other characters and phrases, making it a flexible and popular meme format online.
