What is Can I Copy Your Homework??

A Twitter joke format from 2016 that compares two pieces of pop culture, suggesting one looks like a knockoff of the other with small changes made to disguise the copying.

Where did Can I Copy Your Homework? come from?

The earliest version came from @essentialpeach on October 18, 2016, in a tweet comparing animated films. It went viral in December 2016 through a @castofhp tweet comparing Ed Sheeran and Rupert Grint.

What does Can I Copy Your Homework? mean?

It accuses one piece of pop culture of imitating another, with the dialogue mimicking the schoolyard trick of copying a classmate's work and tweaking it so the copy isn't obvious.

How do you use Can I Copy Your Homework??

Post two images with the three-line script asking to copy homework, agreeing to tweak it so the copying isn't obvious, then replying 'ok,' placing the alleged imitator next to the original.

Is Can I Copy Your Homework? still popular?

Peak attention came in late 2016 and early 2017 during the Friends versus Living Single discussion covered by The Daily Dot. The script is still referenced when people call out suspicious copying between two pieces of pop culture.

Can I Copy Your Homework?

2016catchphraseclassic

Published October 26, 2026

Can I Copy Your Homework? started as a Twitter joke format in late 2016 pairing two pieces of pop culture where one looks suspiciously derivative of the other. Posts use the schoolyard script about borrowing a classmate's assignment and changing a few details to avoid obvious plagiarism. By January 2017, the Friends versus Living Single version of the joke drew Daily Dot coverage.

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Overview

Each Can I Copy Your Homework? post places two images side by side with a short three-line script. One speaker asks 'Can I copy your homework?' the other agrees but says to change it so the copy isn't obvious, and the first speaker replies 'ok'1. The humor comes from the comparison implying that the second image is a lightly disguised knockoff of the first, with the imitation always presented as inferior to the source4.

Early subjects ran from animated films and musicians to sitcoms and celebrity lookalikes. The template works best when the two subjects share obvious visual or structural similarities, letting the dialogue stand in for an accusation of copying. Posts tend to use film and TV screenshots or celebrity photographs instead of illustrations1.

Gallery

Origin & Background

Platform

Twitter

Creator

@essentialpeach; @castofhp

Date

2016

The format first appeared on Twitter on October 18, 2016, when @essentialpeach tweeted several comparisons between animated features from DreamWorks, Disney, and Pixar, including Up and Kung Fu Panda, alongside lesser known movies that borrowed from them2. A handful of similar posts went up over the next two months without catching on widely4.

How It Spread

Momentum arrived on December 18, 2016, when Harry Potter fan account @castofhp tweeted a photo of Ed Sheeran next to Rupert Grint, who plays Ron Weasley, with the caption 'can I copy your homework?' / 'yeah just change it up a bit so it doesn't look obvious you copied' / 'ok'3. That post collected around 24,000 retweets and 32,000 likes by early January 20174.

From there the Can I Copy Your Homework? template spread into other fandoms as users applied it to pop culture comparisons, with the imitation always presented as inferior to the source4. One late December thread compared the 1990s sitcom Friends to Living Single, with filmmaker Matthew A. Cherry noting that both shows centered on six friends in New York City and were produced by Warner Bros., but Living Single featured an all-black cast5. The Daily Dot documented the Friends and Living Single discussion on January 5, 2017, pointing to one-on-one character matches between the two shows and a video of Queen Latifah commenting on the similarities1. A Twitter Moment compiled standout examples the same day.

Timeline

2016-10-18

@essentialpeach posts the earliest known version comparing animated films from DreamWorks, Disney, and Pixar to lesser known imitators[2].

2016-12-18

@castofhp tweets the Ed Sheeran and Rupert Grint comparison that collects roughly 24,000 retweets and 32,000 likes by early January 2017[3].

2016-12-30

Matthew A. Cherry posts the Friends versus Living Single comparison that starts a wider conversation about the two shows[5].

2017-01-05

The Daily Dot writes about the Friends and Living Single discussion, and a Twitter Moment compiles standout examples the same day[1].

How to Use This Meme

Posts follow a three-line script. The first line asks 'Can I copy your homework?' the second says some version of 'yeah just change it a bit so it doesn't look obvious you copied,' and the third replies 'ok.' Each line sits beside a related image, with the second and third images showing the supposed knockoff next to the original. Common subjects include two musicians who look alike, TV shows with mirrored cast structures, or films that borrow plot elements.