Have you ever had a dream about wandering through an eerie, empty mall? You might have entered what TikTok refers to as “Mall World.”
A reliable rule of the internet is that there is always someone out there who has experienced the same weird, seemingly unique event that you have.
TikTok’s algorithm is famous for pushing users into narrow silos, delivering hyper-specific content that can feel uncannily accurate (which is why many believe that their phones are listening to their conversations).
For some users, even their dreams seem to be known to the algorithm, and after sharing their experiences of Mall World, many are shocked to find that others know exactly what they are talking about.
What Is ‘Mall World’?
Mall World is a surreal, sprawling mall that some people visit in their dreams—the dreamscape is common enough to have become a trending topic online.
The phenomenon has its own subreddit, and plenty of TikTok videos where users describe their trips to Mall World.
While not everyone is seeing the exact same interiors, many have noted that there are consistent landmarks, such as a large food court or lengthy escalators.
Most say that the mall is empty or abandoned, and seems to go on forever, like a never-ending maze.
The mall sometimes leads to other spaces, such as infinity staircases, or endless office and apartment corridors. Some have even tried to draw maps of Mall World, which has become a collective project on TikTok.
Charting the mercurial flow of the dream world might seem an impossible task, but TikTokers reckon that there’s enough consistency to create at least a rough map of Mall World.
At this point, Mall World starts to cross boundaries into a meme or shared artistic project, echoing similar internet trends such as the Backrooms and liminal spaces.
These trends aim to invoke an unsettling sense of nostalgia, with social media users posting eerie photos of dead malls, swimming pools, indoor playgrounds and airports.
Posts describing Mall World share a strong similarity with these trends, suggesting that online nostalgia is bleeding into the collective unconscious.
Why Are So Many People Dreaming Of ‘Mall World’?
It’s impossible to say for certain, but the childhood experience of wandering through a huge, intimidating mall with a parent is near-universal, and perhaps inspires strange dreams and memories later in life.
Malls are odd places, when one really looks at them—they tend to feature unusual architecture designed with glossy, corporate minimalism—unnaturally bright lights, smooth lines and clean, white surfaces everywhere.
A busy, well-stocked mall can be an intense sensory experience, as the shopper is surrounded by signifiers shrieking at them for attention, every corner offering an opportunity to open their wallet.
Empty malls, however, have a very different tone. Standing alone in such a vast indoor space, designed to hold so many people, can invoke a feeling of dread.
Some malls are almost like sprawling cathedrals, temples of consumerism, with cheery pop music always playing somewhere in the distance.
In short, they are strange places, and that uncanny feeling becomes clearer as the mall empties out and stores begin to shutter—few places are more unsettling than a dead mall.
Of course, the fact that the liminal spaces trend has been popular online for so many years, spreading imagery of eerie, artificial locations that seem to stretch to infinity, might be influencing people’s dreams.
Perhaps we’re all spending too many of our precious hours on Earth buying things, online and outside, making our world feel like one endless mall, and that mundane reality is reflected in our subconscious.
Simply reading about Mall World might well result in a visit to the unearthly dreamscape.
If you visit there tonight, make sure to take some notes—the internet might be able to figure this thing out, eventually.