A peculiar moment can happen when it comes to adult friendships A woman may have coworkers she likes, parents she chats with at school pickup, hundreds of social media connections and a phone full of contacts, yet still find herself wishing she had someone new to call a real friend.

Making friends seemed easier when we were younger. School, college, first jobs and early adulthood routinely put the same people in the same places. There was time to talk without scheduling a three-week email chain first. As women get older , careers, partners, children, caregiving and other responsibilities can make that kind of repeated contact harder to find.

Research on adult friendship suggests that this is part of the problem. Friendship often develops through proximity, repeated interaction, shared experiences, and gradually increasing personal disclosure. One frequently cited study by University of Kansas professor Jeffrey Hall found that it takes roughly 50 hours together to move from acquaintance to casual friend, with much more time needed to develop a close friendship.

Finding 50 spare hours may sound ambitious for a woman already trying to find 15 uninterrupted minutes to drink her coffee.

At the same time, friendship matters. Research and surveys continue to link strong social relationships to emotional wellbeing, and research on female friendship and wellbeing has highlighted the role women often place on social support during periods of stress.

The question is how women create those relationships when their lives no longer make friendship easy.

Adult Friendship Changes As Women’s Lives Change

Friendships rarely exist in a vacuum. They develop alongside careers, marriages, children, moves, divorces, illnesses, caregiving responsibilities, and countless other changes.

“People get set in their routines, and there also is a lack of practice getting out there and trying to make new friends,” says Michelle Mintz, LCSW-R, a New York psychotherapist who works with individuals, couples and families. “Work and family demands can make us feel pulled in different directions.”

Mintz says life changes can make it especially hard to find time to meet potential friends. She also sees a lingering effect from the pandemic, with some people becoming more accustomed to staying home and less inclined to go out socially.

That can leave women in an uncomfortable position. They may genuinely want more connection while feeling that creating it takes energy they don’t have.

Existing friendships can also shift as women’s circumstances change. One woman has a baby while her closest friend remains child-free. Another becomes consumed with caring for an aging parent. Someone gets divorced and suddenly finds herself living a very different social life from the couples she has known for years. Children grow up, careers change, and women who once shared nearly everything can discover that their daily lives have moved in different directions.

“Sometimes we have friends who go through similar life cycle changes, and some who do not,” Mintz says. “Sometimes friends might pull away because they are not in the same ‘life cycle stage’ as you.”

That does not necessarily mean an old friendship has run its course. Mintz encourages women who value the relationship to talk openly with a friend who has become distant and let that person know they still want them in their life. At the same time, meeting people who share a current experience can provide a different kind of support.

“It is also helpful to have friends who are going through similar experiences because they really understand what you are going through,” she says.

Adult Friendship Can Become Especially Important During Transitions

That desire to find someone who “gets it” is part of the idea behind Marco Polo Circles , a program from asynchronous video messaging app Marco Polo that places women in small groups based on shared interests, identities, and stages of life.

The groups can center around experiences such as new motherhood , raising teenagers, perimenopause, empty nesting, divorce and widowhood. Participants communicate through asynchronous video, so they don’t have to coordinate schedules for everyone to be available at the same time.

Meagan Allers, Head of Partnerships and Community at Marco Polo, says the company noticed that some of the strongest relationships forming within its community were between women experiencing similar stages of life.

“They are looking for someone to lean on for support and share experiences,” Allers says.

One group that particularly caught her attention was women over 60.

“These are women who are becoming empty nesters, maybe going through a divorce or recently became a widow and are looking to meet new friends as they are rediscovering who they are,” she says.

There can also be freedom in meeting someone who has no preconceived idea of who you are supposed to be.

“There’s something nice about meeting friends who don’t know your entire life history and can get to know you in the stage you’re currently in,” Allers says.

That idea may resonate during transitions that change a woman’s sense of identity. A longtime friend may remember every version of you, which can be comforting. A new friend meets the person you are now.

Both relationships can have value.

Adult Friendship Requires More Than Meeting Someone

Of course, being introduced to someone with similar circumstances does not automatically create a friendship.

One of the harder parts of making friends as an adult is figuring out how to move from “someone I like” to someone you actually call, confide in, and make room for in your life.

Research into how adult friendships form and deepen points to time and repeated interaction as important ingredients. Research on friendship quality has also examined the importance of closeness and supportive relationships, including academic work archived by the University of Gothenburg .

Mintz believes curiosity and vulnerability are especially important.

“Engaging in curiosity shows the other person that you want to get to know them and are interested in learning about who they are,” she says.

Vulnerability matters too, but it doesn’t require revealing your entire personal history the first time you meet someone.

“If you can share a similar experience, or something about yourself that shows you have been through a challenging experience and came out the other side, this shows the other person that they are not alone,” Mintz says. “This builds safety and connection.”

In other words, adult friendship may require a little courage. Someone has to ask the second question, suggest getting together again, admit they’re struggling, or risk being the one to reach out first.

Adult Friendship Meets Technology

Technology has changed what it means to stay in touch. A friend can live across the country, work an opposite schedule, or juggle children, caregiving, and a demanding career, yet remain part of everyday life. During the pandemic, digital communication became especially important as in-person interaction was limited and video calls, messages, and online communities offered ways to maintain relationships despite physical distance.

Those tools continue to make connection more accessible. For women whose schedules rarely align, friends and family members who live far apart, or people who cannot meet regularly in person, technology can help relationships continue through life stages that might otherwise make staying close difficult.

Still, having more ways to communicate does not automatically create deeper relationships.

“We’re constantly on the go, moving from one activity to another,” Allers says. “Technology like texting and social media allow us to feel like we’re making and maintaining connections to others, but these typically aren’t truly meaningful connections.”

The distinction may lie less in whether technology is involved and more in how it’s used. Scrolling through someone’s updates or exchanging an occasional text can keep people aware of one another’s lives. At the same time, more personal forms of communication may offer greater opportunities for conversation and connection.

Allers believes asynchronous video can occupy an interesting space between texting and a scheduled phone or video call. Marco Polo Circles lets participants see facial expressions, hear voices, and share pieces of their everyday lives without requiring everyone to be available at the same time.

Members have told the company that those visual details can lead conversations in unexpected directions. Allers recalls one participant whose artwork appeared in the background of a video message. Another woman noticed it, which led to a conversation about their shared interest in art.

The format can also give people more time to listen. Rather than immediately preparing a response during a live conversation, someone can hear what a friend has said, think about it, and reply when she has the time and emotional bandwidth to engage.

Research suggests room for both digital and in-person connection. A 2022 study published in Computers in Human Behavior Reports examined how young adults viewed interactions with close friends online compared with face-to-face interactions. Participants described online communication as accessible and particularly useful for geographically distant friends, while some reported feeling more comfortable or confident communicating online. Face-to-face interactions, however, were generally perceived as more intimate and meaningful.

The findings suggest that the question may not be whether technology is good or bad for friendship. Instead, different forms of communication may serve different needs. A video message cannot replace every coffee date, hug, or long conversation over dinner. Still, physical distance, busy schedules, and major life changes do not always make those moments possible.

For adult women trying to maintain old friendships or create new ones, technology can provide another place for connection to begin and continue. What happens in that space still depends on something decidedly human: whether people make time to listen, share, and gradually let someone else into their lives.

Adult Friendship May Need Space To Grow

Marco Polo says many Circles groups remain active after the four-week experience ends, with some participants eventually meeting in person. According to Allers, women sometimes enter a group unsure what they could have in common with another participant, then discover connections as conversations continue.

That may be one of the more useful lessons about adult friendship itself.

Adults can become efficient about relationships. Limited time encourages people to make quick assessments about who seems compatible, who lives nearby, who has children the same age, or who appears to share similar interests. Friendship doesn’t always fit a checklist.

A person who seems completely different during an introduction may eventually become the one who makes you laugh hardest, listens without judgment, or sends a message on exactly the day you need it.

Technology can create another place for those introductions to happen. Whether an introduction becomes a meaningful friendship still depends on what people do afterward.

Mintz encourages women to stay open and flexible and to put themselves in situations where connection is possible deliberately. Sustaining friendship also requires making room for it.

“We all are so busy, but it’s important to carve out time to connect with other women and sustain friendships,” she says.

Technology can help create that opening, especially when distance, schedules, or life circumstances make traditional ways of meeting difficult. What follows still requires curiosity, vulnerability, and time.

After all, some of the most important friendships in our lives may still be with people we haven’t met yet.

Overall, adult friendship may require more intention than it once did, but that does not make it any less meaningful. The challenge is creating enough room in busy lives for a new relationship to move beyond an introduction, a shared experience or a first conversation.