Finding a friend through an app may sound awkward, but it's not

Making friends in New York City can be tough. I moved here three years ago for graduate school and didn’t know a single person. 

I’ve managed to cobble together a wonderful group of people who have helped me navigate my 20s over countless beers at many happy hours – but making friends just isn’t as easy as an adult as it was in college or high school. Today, many of those best friends live in Chicago, or Cleveland, or San Francisco.

So when the dating app Bumble launched its BFF feature in early March – which, instead of finding romantic partners for users, finds friends – I wanted to learn more.

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Bumble, which launched in late 2014, is a dating app that works similarly to Tinder; in fact, it was founded by Tinder co-founder Whitney Wolfe. The big difference is that a female Bumble user has 24 hours to start a conversation before the connection expires. The same applies to Bumble BFF (available to men and women), except either user can start the conversation. 

Bumble as a whole has 3 million users, according to the Huffington Post, and reported that there were 1 million swipes in the BFF feature during the first week alone. According to the same article, roughly 60 percent of those swipes were women on the hunt for platonic friendships. 

Bumble BFF isn’t alone in the friend-finding space: Hey! Vina also connects lady friends, and an app called Meet My Dog connects dog owners.

Millions of people find partners via Tinder and Hinge. Why not friends?

While it might seem strange to meet friends via an app, we use on-demand apps for everything from groceries to finding dates, so looking for a new pal to spend some time with is a natural extension of what's already so common. 

I spent an afternoon swiping on potential BFFs, before matching with Veronica. She looked friendly, and her profile said she was interested in food and politics. I can talk about food and politics! We arranged to meet at a nearby coffee shop.

I am pretty comfortable in social situations, but this scenario did make me uneasy. Meeting a total stranger and hoping for a friendship is unquestionably more intimidating than going to a party and/or meeting a friend-of-a-friend for drinks in a more organic, less-forced setting.

But luckily, Veronica and I hit it off right away. She is easy going, intelligent and also a writer. We talked about our experiences in New York City, our favorite restaurant spots and families.

When the date was over, I genuinely felt as if I had found a potential friend – although, of course, it’s tough to really get to know someone based on just one hour-long experience.

But regardless, the feature is a fun, different way to make friends in a new city or in general. If millions of people can find partners on dating apps like Tinder, Bubble BFF is a solid step in shaking the taboo of taking a similar approach for friendships.

Check out the video above to learn more about my experience with the app.

BONUS: See how hard it is to keep up with current dating apps

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