‘滚雪球’ (gǔn xuě qiú) literally means ‘to roll a snowball’ — picturing how a small snowball grows larger and heavier as it rolls down a snowy hill, picking up more snow along the way. Figuratively, it describes any process that starts small but accelerates rapidly in size, influence, or effect due to self-reinforcing growth — such as debt, reputation, investment returns, or viral trends.

The word combines three characters: 滚 (gǔn, ‘to roll’), 雪 (xuě, ‘snow’), and 球 (qiú, ‘ball’). Though rooted in a physical image, it’s almost always used metaphorically in modern Chinese. It commonly appears in business, finance, education, and social contexts — for example, describing how initial customer feedback leads to rapid product improvement, or how early success attracts more resources and momentum.