What Is the Milk Crate Challenge? Videos Go Viral of People Testing Their Balance

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A video showing a man participating in the so-called Milk Crate Challenge went viral, gaining 5 million views on Twitter as of Sunday.

The footage, posted by multimedia production company Sir Veillance Studios, shows a man attempting to climb and go back down a staircase made of plastic milk crates while allegedly rolling a weed joint without falling.

When he reaches the ground, the man lights up the alleged substance celebrating the victory of passing the task. A small crowd can be seen in the video gathered around the crates cheering for the man and filming hilm.

WARNING: Footage below depicts a scene and contains strong language that may be disturbing to viewers.

A man by the name of White Mike has set a new world record, being the 1st person to complete the Milk Crate Challenge while rolling a blunt?? pic.twitter.com/V4RdzAWRhd

— Sir Veillance Studios © (@SirVstudios) August 21, 2021

What is the Milk Crate Challenge?

The challenge grew popular over the past several days among many people, according to Complex. People have been filming the challenge and posting it under #MilkCrateChallenge on social media. With the trend growing, people began placing large bets, on who wins the challenge.

Not all the videos posted show participants rolling joints as they climb up and go back down the staircase of milk crates. But a number of clips have been posted showing participants' failed attempts at completing the task as they struggle to maintain their balance.

Milk Crate Challenge Going Crazy ?????????? #MilkCrate #Challenge #Funny pic.twitter.com/wykSEeTCTU

— Yesssterday (@Yesssterday) August 19, 2021

Social media is flooded with new trends and challenges that go viral among people who are eager to try strange and crazy things.

In June, a trend went viral on TikTok called the Starburst Challenge that is about people kissing with the candy in their mouths. Young people can be seen on the video-sharing app using the candy to make clips. It was first introduced on May 5, when TikTok user @saraballinnn shared a video of herself miming along to a song with text overlaying the footage that read: "making out after eating Starbursts >>".

"Definitely recommend," she wrote in the caption. The clip has since been viewed 3.5 million times, and received 740,000 likes.

The hashtag #starburstchallenge currently has over 23.5 million views on the platform.

However, some potentially risky challenges have circulated social media as well, including the Blackout Challenge, which was linked to the death of a 10-year-old girl in Italy. The challenge requires participants to hold their breath and prevent their airflow, aiming to lose consciousness.

In a transparency report covering the second half of 2020, TikTok said that it had removed 89,132,938 videos worldwide for violating the platform's terms of service or community guidelines. The figure is less than 1 percent of all videos uploaded on TikTok.

"Of those videos, we identified and removed 92.4 percent before a user reported them, 83.3 percent before they received any views, and 93.5 percent within 24 hours of being posted," the report read.

Milk Crate Challenge
Stock photo. A video showing a man participating in the so-called Milk Crate Challenge went viral Saturday on social media, gaining three million views. istock/Getty/Tero Vesalainen

About the writer

Fatma Khaled is a Newsweek weekend reporter based in New York City. Her focus is reporting on U.S. politics, world news, and general interest news. Her coverage in the past focused on business, immigration, culture, LGBTQ issues, and international politics. Fatma joined Newsweek in 2021 from Business Insider and had previously worked at The New York Daily News and TheStreet with contributions to Newlines Magazine, Entrepreneur, Documented NY, and Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, among others. She is a graduate of Columbia University where she pursued a master's degree focusing on documentary filmmaking and long-form journalism. You can get in touch with Fatma by emailing f.khaled@newsweek.com. Languages: English, Arabic, German.


Fatma Khaled is a Newsweek weekend reporter based in New York City. Her focus is reporting on U.S. politics, world ... Read more