Why It’s So Hard to Make Friends as an Adult

Making friends as an adult has always been difficult. But the "loneliness epidemic" we’re seeing today is the result of both our biology and the dramatic way technology has reshaped our lifestyles. Several factors have come together at once.

In our youth, friendships formed almost effortlessly — through school, university, neighborhoods, and shared social circles. When we see the same people regularly, we tend to like them simply because they’re always around. Over time, that turns into friendship. As adults, we rarely have environments like that anymore.

We spend far more time at home: working remotely, ordering groceries, exercising online, watching movies on laptops instead of going to the cinema, and maintaining connections via social media rather than in person. As a result, the chances of forming friendships offline have dropped significantly.

Because friendships in youth often developed organically, we assume that’s how it should always work. But in adulthood, friendships rarely happen on their own. They require initiative, time, and repeated interactions. Research shows that people who believe friendship is purely a matter of luck tend to become lonelier with age. Those who understand that friendship requires effort are more likely to build strong social circles.

We often expect a new person to understand us as deeply as childhood friends who’ve been through everything with us. But friendship doesn’t start with deep intimacy — it grows from shared experiences. If you expect to instantly meet your perfect best friend, you may become disappointed too quickly and push away people who could have become close over time.

We increasingly confuse observing other people’s lives with real communication. Social media helps maintain old friendships but is not very effective for building new, meaningful ones. True friendship still depends on in-person interaction — reading facial expressions, gestures, tone of voice, and simply being physically present.

In short: friendship used to be a byproduct of life. Now it’s a separate area that requires intentional time and effort.

See each other regularly and share new emotional experiences as often as possible.
The most important factor in friendship is frequency of contact. Without maintaining communication and investing time, even warm friendships gradually fade into casual acquaintance.

There isn’t much direct research yet on AI’s impact specifically on friendship, so I’d split this into two parts: what we know about human connection in general, and my personal view.

From a biological perspective, real friendship isn’t built on words alone. Attachment depends on touch, hugs, nonverbal signals, physical presence, and shared real-life experiences. Also, having a "village" — a sense of belonging — is a fundamental human need tied to survival and safety. AI cannot provide that.

Tinder, in theory, helps you find one romantic partner — after which you no longer need the app. Frienda solves a different problem: it helps you build a "village" of friends — not just one person, but a whole range of connections, from a best friend to build a life with to someone you might meet once for yoga or a concert.

You can have far more friends than romantic partners. We don’t need to artificially keep users inside the app. On the contrary, we aim to help women find friends quickly so they’ll come back.

We also see Frienda as more than just adapting dating mechanics for friendship. For example, we’re interested in connecting women not only by city but also within existing communities. This supports women’s communities while helping community managers attract new members for free. We’ve already launched this feature and are currently testing it with the first 20 communities.

At first, we launched Frienda with a mechanic very similar to Tinder: you browse profiles, send likes, and wait for a mutual match. If you want to see incoming requests, you purchase a subscription.

In practice, however, this model proved unintuitive for many users. A significant share of women on Frienda are already in relationships and have never used dating apps, so the very logic of matching isn’t immediately clear to them.

Secondly, we ran into a familiar issue for the category: ghosting. Some users would like profiles indiscriminately, accumulate matches, but never move the conversation forward, or drop off shortly after it began. Formally, a connection was made, but it rarely translated into real-life friendships or meetings.

One simple reason: I’m a woman, and female friendship matters deeply to me. As I’ve gotten older, I’ve felt a stronger need for it — discussing children, beauty routines, women’s health, menopause prevention, family relationships, and more. Time with female friends feels restorative — almost like a biological need.

I’m also inspired by the idea of bringing people together. Bring women together — and you bring the world together. I truly believe we need this now.

More broadly, research shows that male and female friendships tend to differ. Men often bond in groups and build closeness through shared activities — sports, work, hobbies. Female friendship tends to center more on emotional support and deep conversation.

According to our data, users previously sent about three friend requests per week. Now, even in the free version, introverts can send seven sparks — one per day. So technically, there are more opportunities than before.

We don’t want to follow the path of dating apps, where users endlessly swipe, collect matches, and never build real connections. That works especially poorly for friendship. So we deliberately focus on quality over quantity.

Not just possible — necessary. Socializing is like a muscle: the less you use it, the weaker it becomes.
Practically speaking, two things matter most.

You won’t instantly become friends with people you randomly met once. You need repeated interactions — seeing the same people regularly and gradually getting closer. One-off events like lectures or business breakfasts rarely work. Better formats include ongoing courses, tennis classes, running clubs, dance studios, or business communities.

Start by doing something you genuinely enjoy. Then, among the people there, look for those with one or two additional overlaps — maybe you’re both entrepreneurs, or both mothers with children of similar ages, or from the same city.