Friendship Statistics 2026: The Data on a Disappearing Social Life
These friendship statistics show that adult friendship is not just feeling harder — it is measurably declining. Fewer close friends, less time together, and a growing share of people with no one to call. Here is what the research actually shows, and why.
Last updated: June 2026 · Compiled by the Mindfuse editorial team
15%
of US men have no close friends (was 3% in 1990)
12%
of Americans report no close friends at all
2.23
average close friends in 2021 (was 2.94 in 1990)
49%
of Americans wish they had more friends
61%
of young adults report serious loneliness
26%
feel they know most of their neighbours
~150
relationships humans can sustain (Dunbar)
Under-35
have fewer close friends than prior generations
How adult friendship has thinned since 1990
The share of American men with no close friends rose from 3% in 1990 to 15% in 2021 — a fivefold increase.
The Survey Center on American Life’s American Perspectives Survey documented a steep collapse in men’s close friendships over three decades. The decline was sharpest for men, but women were not immune.
Cox, D. A., "The State of American Friendship: Change, Challenges, and Loss," Survey Center on American Life (2021).
The share of American women with no close friends rose from about 2% in 1990 to 10% in 2021.
Women still report more close friendships than men on average, but the same survey found their friendship circles shrinking too — evidence that the trend is structural rather than confined to one group.
Cox, D. A., Survey Center on American Life (2021).
The average number of close friends fell from 2.94 in 1990 to 2.23 in 2021.
Across the population, Americans report fewer intimates than a generation ago. The share with ten or more close friends dropped from roughly a third to about one in eight over the same period.
Cox, D. A., Survey Center on American Life (2021).
About 12% of Americans now report having no close friends, up from 3% in 1990.
Roughly one in eight adults say they have no one they would count as a close friend — quadruple the rate three decades earlier. The figure is one of the most cited markers of the modern friendship recession.
Cox, D. A., Survey Center on American Life (2021).
What people say they are missing
49% of Americans say they wish they had more friends.
Cigna’s loneliness research found nearly half of US adults wanting a larger circle, alongside high rates of feeling left out or lacking companionship. Wanting more connection turned out to be close to a majority experience.
Cigna, "Loneliness and the Workplace: 2020 U.S. Report" (2020).
61% of young adults reported serious loneliness during the early 2020s.
Harvard’s Making Caring Common project found young adults (18–25) the loneliest age group surveyed, with around six in ten reporting serious loneliness — overturning the assumption that isolation is mainly a problem of old age.
Weissbourd, R. et al., "Loneliness in America," Harvard Graduate School of Education, Making Caring Common (2021).
Adults under 35 report fewer close friends than previous generations did at the same age.
Gallup’s tracking of social ties finds younger cohorts entering adulthood with thinner friendship networks than earlier generations had — a generational shift, not just a life-stage dip.
Gallup, social connection tracking (reported 2023); see also Survey Center on American Life (2021).
Where the hours went
Time spent socialising in person has fallen markedly since the 1970s.
The American Time Use Survey and earlier time-diary research show face-to-face socialising declining over decades, with a particularly steep drop among young people in the 2010s as screen time rose. Companionship has been quietly displaced.
U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, American Time Use Survey; analysis in Twenge, "iGen" (2017).
Only about a quarter of Americans say they know most of their neighbours.
Pew found neighbourhood familiarity has weakened, with roughly 26% saying they know most of their neighbours and far fewer interacting with them regularly — eroding one of the classic engines of casual friendship: repeated, low-stakes proximity.
Pew Research Center, "Americans’ Relationships with Their Neighbors" (2018/2019).
What the research says about how bonds form
Humans can maintain roughly 150 relationships, with about five close intimates.
Anthropologist Robin Dunbar’s research proposes that cognitive limits cap our stable social network at around 150 people, arranged in layers — roughly 5 closest, 15 good friends, 50 friends. The innermost circle is small by design, which is why losing even one or two close ties matters so much.
Dunbar, R. I. M., "Coevolution of neocortical size, group size and language in humans," Behavioral and Brain Sciences (1993); Dunbar, "Friends" (2021).
Friendship forms through proximity, repeated unplanned contact, and gradual vulnerability.
Psychologist Marisa Franco’s synthesis of the research emphasises that adult friendships rarely appear spontaneously; they are built through continued, unscripted exposure and the willingness to self-disclose. The decline of repeated in-person contact removes the very conditions friendship needs.
Franco, M. G., "Platonic: How the Science of Attachment Can Help You Make — and Keep — Friends," G. P. Putnam’s Sons (2022).
- Cox, D. A., "The State of American Friendship: Change, Challenges, and Loss," Survey Center on American Life / AEI (2021).
- Cigna, "Loneliness and the Workplace: 2020 U.S. Report" (2020).
- Weissbourd, R. et al., "Loneliness in America," Harvard Graduate School of Education, Making Caring Common (2021).
- Gallup, social connection and friendship tracking (reported 2023).
- Pew Research Center, "Americans’ Relationships with Their Neighbors" (2018).
- U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, American Time Use Survey.
- Dunbar, R. I. M., "Friends: Understanding the Power of Our Most Important Relationships," Little, Brown (2021).
- Franco, M. G., "Platonic," G. P. Putnam’s Sons (2022).
- Twenge, J. M., "iGen," Atria Books (2017).
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