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Xennials are a "microgeneration" of people who were born between 1977 and 1985.
There are meaningful differences between their lives. For example, Xennials were already in the workforce when the recession hit, while many millennials were just graduating college.
If you were born between the years 1977 and 1985, you're officially a member of the "micro-generation" known as Xennials.
The term was coined by Sarah Stankorb in a 2014 Good magazine article, to describe a group that straddles Generation X - born between 1965 and 1980 - and millennials - born between 1981 and 1996, according to the Pew Research Center.
Xennials, according to Stankorb and the many similar stories that followed, grew up watching "My So-Called Life" and popping cassettes into the stereo, but transitioned pretty seamlessly to using smartphones and social media.
Some people call them the "Oregon Trail generation," after the once-popular computer game, or "Generation Catalano," after Jared Leto's character in "My So-Called Life."
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Below, we've outlined some of the biggest differences between Xennials and their slightly younger siblings, millennials.
Xennials were already in the workforce when the recession hit. Many Millennials, however, were just graduating college and looking for jobs. Interestingly, some research suggests that Xennials may have been hit hardest by the recession, because of a combination of student loan debt, job losses, and other factors.
Many Xennials made it through their childhood and teen years without social media — no Facebook or even MySpace. Many millennials, on the other hand, had MySpace and Facebook accounts before entering college.
On September 11, 2001, Xennials were in their teens and 20s; millennials were much younger. As one writer said of Xennials, "much of our childhoods were spared the dark shadow cast by tragedy and war," while millennials were somewhat shaken out of their innocence.
Xennials generally didn't get cell phones until their 20s. As kids, they used pay phones and called friends' landlines — meaning they had to talk to the friends' parents first. But some millennials were given cell phones as kids or teens.
Overall, Xennials' parents were more relaxed than millennials' helicopter parents. One writer characterized the helicopter parenting style as "achievement-obsessed upper-middle class parents who cared so much about their children's comfortable excellence that they did everything they could to ensure it."
Xennials aren't especially pessimistic, but they aren't as optimistic and confident as millennials tend to be. A 2016 report found that millennials were more optimistic about the future than previous generations of young people.
