Dating apps have a bad reputation. They are often seen as online spaces where people go for casual ‘hook-ups’ or superficial praise, attention, and ego boosts from strangers. These apps are synonymous with non-committal relationships and short-term flings. Nevertheless, women all around the U.S. have turned to these dating apps for an unexpected reason: the pursuit of long-lasting friendships.

In 2016, Bumble launched what they call “BFF mode,” a specific platform on the site for users to connect with each other in a platonic way. Jordan Kreindler, a Boston University brand ambassador for Bumble BFF, spoke of the strengths of the online platform. She said that Bumble BFF is appealing to users because of its diverse community. Everyone there has the opportunity to find someone with the same interests as them because of how vast the app is. According to her, Bumble’s motto “make the first move” fosters a community of inclusion and respect, as it encourages people to present themselves authentically, proactively spark those connections, and accept each other with dignity. “There is a specific energy to Bumble BFF… finding friends on other websites is a game, but Bumble feels safe and organic,” Kreindler said.

Other women on the app seem to share the same sentiment. Kerin, a new Bumble BFF user, acknowledged that she’s found the app to be “a really cool way to chat with people who have similar interests.” This is important, since she recently transferred to a college in Boston and has found it hard to meet people her age due to the pandemic. The closing of social spaces has left some groups more marginalized than others. For example, many mothers have flocked to Bumble BFF to reconstruct a semblance of the communities they would have naturally found in classrooms, daycare centers, and afterschool programs. Their bios say they are mothers searching for other mothers to swipe right on them—either to set up playdates for their children or to connect with someone who understands the experience of being a mother during the pandemic. These women are seeking more than just friendship; they’re searching for empathy and representation within an ‘in-group’ that does not naturally exist because of COVID. Bumble BFF has become a vehicle used to artificially approximate how people naturally socialize.

Nevertheless, not every story is a success story on Bumble BFF. The term “success story” is used on the platform to define a couple that met online and developed a long-term relationship. To have such a term in the first place implies within the vernacular of this community that the status quo is not one of success: Bumble is a place where success stories are highlighted and venerated because of how rare they are. Cheyenne, another user, shared the story of how she met someone on the app, but their friendship did not progress beyond the first meet-up. “She was the sweetest girl I ever met. I never felt so close to someone so fast. I felt very safe with her—we made TikToks, walked around, ate, laughed—but we made plans to hang out a second time, and she ghosted me,” Cheyenne says. Her impression of the app is that it is hard to find a genuine, long-lasting connection with users.

It might be that it’s harder to capture enough of a person’s interest to meet in person without any initial sexual or romantic attraction—as that is what usually prompts users to ‘swipe right’ and seek that first date. The app’s design is counterintuitive to finding a friend. With friendships, connections are built through common interests and shared experiences, not physical attraction, but Bumble’s user interface is made to highlight a person's looks before their personality. In fact, the first thing a user sees about another person is their picture. Then, the chat feature becomes a place to interrogate other users on their interests and backgrounds, but it’s a space where users either get bored of each other or eventually commit to the friendship and take the relationship to another communication medium (like texting, DMs, Snapchat, etc.). For the friendship to survive, it must develop outside of the Bumble app, and that does not make the app self-sustainable. 

On the other hand, the definition of a Bumble BFF is still under construction. The importance of the internet in our everyday life has normalized the existence of online friends, and it’s now common for people to befriend strangers online with similar interests and have a deep relationship, despite never meeting in person. According to Pew Research Center, 57% of teenagers have made at least one friend online, and the New York Post has reported that on average, Americans have made six new friends during quarantine due to online gatherings. 

There is still confusion over the social norms and expectations that come with finding a friend on Bumble BFF. Should they meet in person, or is it possible to construct a friendship entirely online? How much personal information should they share with each other? What is the platonic equivalent of the ‘talking’ stages? How do you ‘break up’ with someone whose friendship did not have that magical spark?

Kreindler’s recommendation to find success on Bumble is to be consistent on the app and to see it as a tool rather than a destination. “We’ve all grown up with digital aids, so Bumble is a natural way to take that step into what the future of socializing will look like,” she says. Though I personally haven’t found any friends on Bumble BFF, I was drawn to the app by the promise that I’d meet new people outside of my circle after my best friend and I parted ways. I’ve found the energy I put into meeting new people isn’t replenished by superficial small-talk and long pauses. People aren’t interesting to me through the screen, and if they spark my interest, it’s not enough to get me to talk to them for longer than a day or two. This online way of meeting people feels artificial to me. Nevertheless, I keep swiping with the hopes that one day I’ll come across my own “success story,” and it’ll be as beautiful as promised.