AIBU to think that a staycation involves actually staying at home?

[cheeseismydownfall]

I have always thought that a staycation is when you take leave from work and stay at home, in your house, taking day trips and generally trying to create a holiday vibe by doing the sort of things that you might normally only do on holiday.

Recently though I have seen it used to mean any holiday in the UK. Surely this is just a regular holiday?!

Other online also suggests there's written evidence of it being used in an article in the US as early as 1944 when people were encouraged to take a STAY-cation instead of a VA-cation, and was used to encourage people to stay at home and not travel across the country for their holidays.

It's a thoroughly irritating word anyway because in the UK we don't talk about a 'vacation' we say 'holiday'. It is an Americanism. I don't say it at all.

But it means 'staying at home' or 'not going on holiday'. However the press and holiday industry seem to be hijacking it to mean staying in the UK.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Staycation#:~:text=A%20staycation%20(a%20portmanteau%20of,does%20not%20require%20overnight%20accommodation.
"In British English the term has increasingly come to mean taking a holiday in one's own country as opposed to travelling abroad (domestic tourism), this is an incorrect use of the term and should be replaced by domestic holiday"

I don't say 'domestic holiday' either. I say 'going to Devon' or 'camping in the UK'.

So, by some people's reckoning, if you live in New York and you travel nearly 3 thousand miles for a holiday in California that would be a staycation because it's in the same country?

Agree with others that the meaning was originally staying in your own house but treating it like a holiday by doing day trips out.

But a little while back some people/newspapers started using it as staying in your own country for a holday, and that new definition has taken off. I hate it. We always holiday in the UK, and it's as if this is no longer classed as a proper holiday. Which is rubbish, because it is. We visit new and different places that we've never been to before, so it's hardly 'staying'. And it does feel like a bit of a put down from people who use it that way, as if only their 'abroad' holidays really count. But as that other version is now established I have to stop letting it bug me!

I assumed it was holidaying in your own country too.

Yanbu, going to a hotel, holiday park or rental in the U.K. is called GOING ON HOLIDAY!

Staycation to mean holidaying in the U.K. is used by those who are embarrassed to be slumming it with a holiday in Devon!

You are not being unreasonable. This new usage of the word is really annoying me. It's so condescending. A holiday is a holiday wherever you go, in your own country or abroad. traveling to sleep overnight in different accommodation, in another part of the country is not equivalent to staying

It also leaves no word for staying in your own home and enjoying the tourist activities on your doorstep. If you're taking a week of annual leave and intend to go out and about from your home each day doing holiday type things, rather than spend the week at home doing DIY, it staycation sums up the difference perfectly.

YANBU OP. My interpretation would be the same as yours.

Official dictionary definition

staycation
[steɪˈkeɪʃ(ə)n]
NOUN
informal
a holiday spent in one's home country rather than abroad, or one spent at home and involving day trips to local attractions.
synonyms:
break · rest · period of leave · day off · week off · month off · recess · school holiday · time off · time out · leave · leave of absence · furlough · sabbatical · trip · tour · journey · expedition · voyage · minibreak · half-term · vacation · hols · vac · vacay · sojourn

YANBU completely agree OP.

Staycation means staying at home and using home as a base to go and do things from instead of a hotel/campsite or whatever.

Travelling and staying overnight somewhere that isn't your home is a vacation... even if it's in the same country

I agree a uk holiday is stilla holiday. A staycation is a break at home!

Well, it comes from the US (hence being 'staycation' not 'stoliday') and I'm pretty sure Americans don't call vacationing within the US a staycation, given that could mean someone from NY vacationing in LA is 'staying' rather than going somewhere (a six-hour flight...)

Of course Americans aren't going to call a holiday in their own country a staycation. Something like two thirds of US citizens don't even have a passport so their norm for going on holiday will be somewhere else in their own country, ie a vacation, or holiday in British English.

A staycation is where you stay at home, but behave as if you are only holiday by not going to work, going on trips, eating out and minimising cooking, cleaning and DIY etc. If you do it right, it can be a really good break and you don't have the bother of packing up and travelling.

Agree. If you to Cornwall or the Lakes or wherever that is a HOLIDAY not a staycation (unless you’re from said areas).

I thought it meant going on holiday fairly locally or in your own country.

Staying at home is called ‘staying at home’.

Not that I’ve ever used the word ‘staycation’ - if I’m going somewhere not to far it’s still a ‘holiday’ and if we’re at home we’re ‘staying at home.’
Staycation is a stupid word.

It's another of those Amaeicanisations that has been bastardised to fit the UK isn't it. So here it has always meant either stayinng at home, going out for day trips AND holidaying in the UK hasn't it?

AKA going on holiday wothout going abroad.

Lots of us do both variations of staycation all the time.

Well we have in the not so many years the horrible concept / word has been used here. 2009 apparently.

It clearly means to stay at home. Always has. Anyone using it to mean holiday in the uk is using it wrongly.

@Chloemol

Official dictionary definition

staycation
[steɪˈkeɪʃ(ə)n]
NOUN
informal
a holiday spent in one's home country rather than abroad, or one spent at home and involving day trips to local attractions.
synonyms:
break · rest · period of leave · day off · week off · month off · recess · school holiday · time off · time out · leave · leave of absence · furlough · sabbatical · trip · tour · journey · expedition · voyage · minibreak · half-term · vacation · hols · vac · vacay · sojourn

That definition appears to be an outlier. I can only find one defining it as that but dozens of others defining it as staying at home

@Chloemol

Official dictionary definition

staycation
[steɪˈkeɪʃ(ə)n]
NOUN
informal
a holiday spent in one's home country rather than abroad, or one spent at home and involving day trips to local attractions.
synonyms:
break · rest · period of leave · day off · week off · month off · recess · school holiday · time off · time out · leave · leave of absence · furlough · sabbatical · trip · tour · journey · expedition · voyage · minibreak · half-term · vacation · hols · vac · vacay · sojourn

Depends on a dictionary. There is way too many😂

I think it is one of those phrases that has changed its meaning over time. Like 'gay' which is not the meaning it had when I was a child.

Yes I always thought staycation meant staying at home and having fun or having days out in your local area.

We don’t get much at all but live in a coastal area so I would consider a staycation to be having time off at home and going to the beach and being a tourist in your area.

I didn’t realise staycation meant holidaying anywhere in the U.K. either.

When I was a kid we’d never get holidays abroad. It was already haven or butlins (which I loved) but still considered it a holiday.

@PuppyMonkey

It’s one of those phrases that has evolved to mean something else because so many people started using it in the wrong way. So the wrong way is now dominant. Annoying.

Same thing happened with Bitchy Resting Face, the original phrase that was termed in some blog or other years ago - so many people wrongly say Resting Bitch Face now, it is the dominant phrase. Even though that makes no sense imho.

Agree with all this I say bitchy resting face and my daughter thinks I'm wrong!

To me it means a holiday that doesn't involve travel abroad. A holiday at home isn't a holiday.

That definition appears to be an outlier. I can only find one defining it as that but dozens of others defining it as staying at home
You really need to learn to use google.

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/dictionary.cambridge.org/amp/english/staycation
Cambridge dictionary:
a holiday that someone spends in their own country or at home, rather than travelling somewhere else

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.collinsdictionary.com/amp/english/staycation
Collins dictionary
A staycation is a holiday that you spend in your own home or your own country, relaxing and enjoying leisure activities there.

www.lexico.com/definition/staycation
Oxford dictionary
A holiday spent in one's home country rather than abroad, or one spent at home and involving day trips to local attractions

www.macmillandictionary.com/dictionary/british/staycation
Macmillan dictionary
a holiday in which you stay at home and visit places near to where you live, or a holiday in your own country

And so on...

I deplore the apparent change in meaning

Having a term that meant holidaying at home (literally, not the wider holidaying in UK) was really useful

We’ve always used it to mean staying at home but having day trips, meals out. We did it for years whilst saving a deposit. We’ve had a few overseas holidays but the vast majority are in the UK, we call both of those holidays.