fast fashion

noun

: an approach to the design, creation, and marketing of clothing fashions that emphasizes making fashion trends quickly and cheaply available to consumers

For many shoppers, Primark has an irresistible offer: trendy clothes at astonishingly low prices. The result is a new and even faster kind of fast fashion, which encourages consumers to buy heaps of items, discard them after a few wears and then come back for another batch of new outfits.

—The Economist

Competition is fierce at every end of the fashion spectrum from luxury to fast fashion.

—Nedra Rhone

In 1985, we bought roughly 31 clothing items per year; now [in 2012] we snap up twice that many thanks to "fast fashion."

—Azeen Ghorayshi

The allure of fast fashion makes sense in times of economic hardship. People still want to dress up, feel good and express their creativity.

—Shama Nasinde

—usually hyphenated when used before another noun

fast-fashion chains/retailers

Examples of fast fashion in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

To address this, Cotton Incorporated collaborated with leading global researchers to quantify plastic leakage across both cotton and synthetic value chains, spanning fast fashion and more traditional apparel categories. —Angela Velasquez, Footwear News, 27 Apr. 2026

Especially with the rise of fast fashion, clothes have become very cheap, but at the cost of their quality. —Lisa Deaderick, San Diego Union-Tribune, 26 Apr. 2026

Items from major fast fashion retailers are an example of something that Johnson won't accept. —Sarah Lyon, Southern Living, 25 Apr. 2026

Much like the public’s awareness of 'fast fashion' and that cheaper isn’t always better, consumers are embracing materials of the earth applied by hand. —Tessa Cooper, Better Homes & Gardens, 20 Apr. 2026

Word History

First Known Use

1975, in the meaning defined above

Rhymes for fast fashion

• compassion
• ashen
• passion
• ration
• aurignacian
• internation