Prepper Terms 101

🚨 The Prepper Lingo You Need to Know

1. EDC (Everyday Carry)

Your daily ride-or-die items — knife, multitool, flashlight, pepper spray, etc. Small, portable, and always with you.

2. Bug Out Bag (BOB)

A backpack packed with 72 hours of survival supplies. It’s the bag you grab when you gotta go. Like now.

3. Bugging Out

Leaving home in an emergency to go somewhere safer. Think wildfire, flood, or full-blown zombie vibes.

4. Bugging In

Staying home, locking the doors, and riding it out like the self-reliant queen you are.

5. Go Bag

A smaller, super-accessible version of your BOB — often kept in the car or by the front door.

6. Get Home Bag (GHB)

This one lives at work, school, or in your trunk. It’s there to help you get home if disaster strikes while you’re out.

7. INCH Bag ("I’m Never Coming Home")

For worst-case scenarios. It’s your long-term survival kit for full off-grid living.

8. SHTF (Sh*t Hits the Fan)

When things go really bad — blackout, supply chain failure, EMP, or civil unrest. You’ll know it when you see it.

9. TEOTWAWKI (The End of the World as We Know It)

A total collapse of normal systems — power, economy, government. No joke, just Plan B.

10. MOLLE (Modular Lightweight Load-carrying Equipment)

Those fancy webbing systems on tactical backpacks? That’s MOLLE. It lets you clip on pouches, gear, and accessories.

11. Paracord

Military-grade rope that can do everything. Build shelter, tie gear, fix stuff, make a tourniquet — you name it.

12. Firestarter

No, not the Stephen King kind. This means ferro rods, waterproof matches, or anything that’ll spark a life-saving flame.

13. Water Purification

Boiling, filtering, or chemically treating water to make it safe to drink. No clean water = no survival.

14. Tactical

Durable, practical gear designed for survival, defense, and looking like you know what you’re doing.

15. Situational Awareness

Being alert. Paying attention. Trusting your gut. Basically, don’t walk through life with your earbuds on full blast.

16. Prepper Pantry

Your stockpile of food, water, hygiene items, and essentials. Enough to ride out weeks (or months) at home.

17. Off-Grid

Living without public utilities. Think solar power, well water, and total independence.

18. Faraday Cage

Protects electronics from EMPs. No, it’s not sci-fi. Yes, your phone could get fried. This keeps it safe.

19. Redundancy

Backup for your backup. Always have extras. Always.

20. 72-Hour Kit

The core of short-term survival. Food, water, meds, and tools to keep you alive for 3 days.

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⚡Bonus Terms You’ll Hear the Deeper You Go

21. Cache

A hidden stash of supplies somewhere off-site. Just in case you can’t get home.

22. Combat Load / Loadout

The specific setup of what you’re carrying — tools, defense, comms — for the situation at hand.

23. EMP (Electromagnetic Pulse)

A high-powered burst that fries electronics. Think lightning on steroids. Yes, it’s real.

24. Golden Horde

A flood of panicked people leaving the cities during a disaster. Not a good time to be stuck in traffic.

25. Gray Man

Looking low-key and blending in. No tactical gear, no “I’m a prepper” flags. Invisible is safe.

26. Martial Law

When the government takes full control — curfews, checkpoints, restrictions. Preppers like to stay ahead of this.

27. BOLO (Be On the Lookout)

Keep your eyes peeled — whether it’s for a threat, a missing person, or your last granola bar.

28. Rule of Threes

A survival truth: 3 minutes without air, 3 hours without shelter, 3 days without water, 3 weeks without food.

29. OPSEC (Operational Security)

Keep your plans, preps, and stockpiles on a need-to-know basis. Loose lips lose rice.

30. Morale Booster

The comfort item that keeps you sane — chocolate, mascara, a playlist, that one cozy hoodie. Don’t forget it.

31. FIFO (First In, First Out)

Stockpiled food goes In, and Out First. 

32.  MRE

Meal, Ready-to-Eat. It’s not just food, it’s a portable survival kit wrapped in brown plastic.