The grapevine refers to the informal way information spreads from person to person through casual conversation and gossip. When you hear something “through the grapevine,” you learned it not from an official announcement but through a chain of people talking to each other. Maybe your friend's older sister told her friend, who told your neighbor, who mentioned it to you at recess.

The term comes from an actual grapevine, the twisting, tangling plant that grapes grow on. Like those vines winding in unpredictable directions, information traveling through the grapevine follows a wandering path from person to person. You might hear through the grapevine that your teacher is planning a surprise quiz, that your school might get new playground equipment, or that a classmate is moving away.

Information from the grapevine can be accurate or wildly wrong. Since each person might add their own interpretation or forget details, the story often changes as it spreads. That's why people say something is “just grapevine talk” when they're not sure it's true. People often stay curious but skeptical about grapevine news until they can check it with a more reliable source.