Friender: Building Real Friendships in a World of Swipe Fatigue

Published 2025-07-25 by Faraz Rahimi

A hackathon-born social app that reimagines how we connect — no swiping, no small talk, just shared interests and genuine people.

Tags: react, flask, entrepreneurship, hackathon, social app, spotify, openai

This post shares the story behind Friender, a social app my friends and I built for the World’s Largest Hackathon. It's not just about what we built, but why we built it — the problem we were trying to solve, the process of turning an idea into a working product, what we learned along the way, and what comes next. If you've ever felt that meeting new people in real life has become strangely difficult, you're not alone — and this might resonate with you.

The Problem: Connection in the Age of Disconnection

Before this hackathon even started, I found myself stuck on a deeply personal question:

Why is it so hard to make friends in real life, even when we're more digitally connected than ever?

Most platforms we use today are designed to keep us scrolling, not connecting. Social apps focus on image, swiping, and quick impressions. Dating platforms have bled into every kind of interaction. There's small talk, ghosting, and too much pressure to “perform” before you even meet someone.

I didn’t want to build another one of those.

I wanted to create something that made real-life connection easier. Something that focused on shared intentions — like “I want to check out this park” or “Let’s try that new coffee shop” — and helped you find others who genuinely wanted to do the same.

That’s when I called two of my closest friends, Nazanin Mohsenimehr and Arshia Adamian. We’d all talked about this feeling before, and when we saw the announcement for the World’s Largest Hackathon, we knew this was our chance to act on it.

I booked a flight and flew from the U.S. to Canada so we could work together, in person. That decision changed everything.

What started as a late-night idea quickly became Friender — a social app designed not for likes or matches, but for doing things with people you actually click with.

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What is Friender?

Friender is a social app built for people who are tired of surface-level interactions.

It helps you meet others based on real-life behavior, lifestyle, and shared interests — not bios, photos, or social performance.

But here’s what really makes Friender different:
• You see people first, not public events or activities. You’re matched based on meaningful data — music preferences, behavioral patterns, and intentions.
• Then, and only then, you’re shown what those matches are planning to do.
• This flips the model of traditional event discovery and makes every activity *socially relevant* before you even consider joining.

There’s no feed full of strangers. No endless swiping. No pressure to craft a perfect bio. Just natural connections, made through real-world intentions.

We designed Friender to feel like asking your group chat:
> “Hey, anyone up for going to this gallery opening?”
Except instead of being limited to friends you already know, Friender expands that circle — intelligently and meaningfully.

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The Build: From Idea to Working Prototype

Once we were together, we focused on a single guiding question:
**What would make *us* want to use this?**

We agreed on what we *didn’t* want:
• No profile-first systems that force premature judgment
• No feeds overloaded with options and noise
• No time-wasting onboarding or personality quizzes

Instead, we built around this philosophy:

> People first. Activities second. Intent always.

We created a smooth onboarding process that uses data you already generate — like your Spotify listening habits — to understand your personality and match you with others.

We then used OpenAI’s API to turn that data into short, expressive summaries of you that feel natural and human.

Everything in Friender is designed to minimize effort while maximizing clarity and authenticity.

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Key Features

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Technologies Used

We had 10 days, so we had to move fast and clean. Here’s what powered Friender:
• Frontend: React with TailwindCSS
• Backend: Python (Flask)
• Authentication & Database: Supabase (PostgreSQL + Auth)
• Hosting: Render (backend), Vercel (frontend)
• APIs:
• Spotify Web API (for user listening data)
• OpenAI API (for personality summaries)
• Supabase Realtime (for auth and user data sync)

Notable Architecture Decisions

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What We Learned

Technical Growth

Personal Growth

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What’s Next for Friender

Friender started as a hackathon submission, but it has grown into something we’re serious about continuing.

Here’s what we’re planning next:
• Alternative onboarding options for users without Spotify (e.g. YouTube history, Google Play Games, Reddit)
• Deeper matching algorithms that include mutual friend graph signals
• Improved privacy controls, including full transparency and granular settings over what data is shared
• Public-facing landing page to gather interest and start waitlist onboarding
• iOS/Android versions, so users can take Friender into the real world with minimal friction

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A Huge Thanks to the Bolt Team

None of this would have happened without the incredible work done by the team behind the Bolt platform and the World’s Largest Hackathon.

From the moment we signed up, we could tell this wasn’t just another online event. Bolt provided a beautifully designed, intuitive space for makers to come together, form teams, and submit projects without the usual confusion and chaos of traditional hackathons.

The platform handled everything — team collaboration, deadlines, project discovery, and updates — with clarity and elegance. That allowed us to focus entirely on the creative and technical work. No wasted energy. No distractions.

What stood out even more was the *tone* of the event. Bolt made us feel welcome. They created a platform that didn’t just scale — it inspired.

They made it easy to share work in progress, cheer each other on, and feel like we were building something as part of a larger community. The fact that we were able to build Friender in such a short time, across borders, is a direct result of the infrastructure Bolt built for us.

Thank you to the entire Bolt team for creating a tool that’s useful, human-centered, and joyful to use. You helped bring this project — and this collaboration — to life in a way we’ll never forget.

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Final Thoughts

Friender isn’t trying to be the next viral app. It’s trying to solve a problem that too many people quietly deal with — the challenge of meeting new people in real life, in a meaningful way.

This app is for anyone who’s ever said:

> “I wish I had someone to go with.”
> “It’s weird going alone.”
> “I want to meet new people, but I don’t know where to start.”

We don’t need more distractions. We need more tools that help us reconnect — with ourselves, our communities, and each other.

If this resonates with you, we’d love to hear your thoughts, ideas, or just share a chat. We’re still building, and the journey is just getting started.

Thanks for reading.

Original post: https://farazrahimi.com/posts/friender-building-real-friendships-in-a-world-of-swipe-fatigue