"Authentic" was one of this year's most looked-up words, according to the lexical leader. That speaks volumes about our quest for truth in an age of algorithms and online artifice.

The word "vaccine" saw a more than 600% increase in lookups this year over last. In its announcement, Merriam-Webster noted that it's come to represent much more than just medicine.

Too much happened in 2020 for Oxford Languages to choose a single word of the year. So they opted for dozens.