Recents are people, places, or things that have been used or seen lately or in the immediate past.

The noun recents comes from the familiar adjective recent, meaning lately happening. Recents can describe anyone or anything that has been used, interacted with, or seen recently. Recents can be used very generally and has specific uses depending on the context in which it is used.

In social media, a recent is a person who you’ve interacted with recently. Your social media recents are often your followers, people you’ve had direct message conversations with, and people who have replied to your posts lately. You may find a list in a social media application called recent or recents, though these labels tend to change frequently.

You may also see recents used as a label in a computer’s operating system (OS). For example, a folder titled recents may list all files, folders, and applications that you’ve opened or used most recently.

Recents can also be used as an antonym for ancients, or those people who displayed deep wisdom and intelligence in the past and are revered, such as great philosophers like Plato. You might compare the ancients to the recents, referring to people of recent times. In this use, Recents (and Ancients) is sometimes capitalized.

Example: My recents page is always clogged with spam messages I accidentally respond to.

Did you mean Recent?