Social media is a great way to share my life with my friends– to post that book I’m currently reading, my morning coffee or just any activity I want my friends to see. However, if you’re like me, you’re looking for an app to post your insignificant moments without paying regard to the like count– wishing it could be eradicated entirely. Luckily, I stumbled upon this app just in the nick of time, almost letting it slip away unnoticed. 

One day, I received a few text messages from my friends saying, “we need this” with a link I was unfamiliar with–only stating it was an “Early Access Invite.” I don’t know about you, but I immediately thought it was a scam link that just kept coming from my closest friends. When I asked what it was, one of my friends, Amy McGee ‘23, explained,”It’s called lapse; it’s basically BeReal but with an old fashioned camera that “develops” your picture and then posts it like an old photo from a digital camera. I don’t really know, I just kept getting sent it so I joined!” 

I was skeptical. However, curiosity got the better of me, and I decided to give it a try. To save you the newbie confusion, I wanted to share my experience with Lapse so you can decide if it might be the right fit for you! 

First I looked into the mission statement to understand what Lapse is all about. Lapse isn’t just another social media app. Co-Founder, Dan Silvertown, in an email statement to TODAY.com stated, “We designed Lapse as a camera to encourage living in the moment and sharing memories pressure-free. We’ve seen a rapid rise in popularity due to the fact that young people are craving a platform that’s focused on sharing moments with friends, not on influencers or celebrities.” This makes it feel like it’s a deliberate departure from the culture of overconsumption. 

They hope that by removing likes and followers they might be able to foster a more authentic and intimate experience, free from the pressure to impress. In my experience, I found that the app felt like a more safe and welcoming environment– I wasn’t posting for anyone but myself and my close circle. It gave me more freedom with my posts knowing only a select few will be able to view. 

I joined to see if it was an app that could be sustained long-term or if it was another fad similar to BeReal. Here’s my thoughts… 

What immediately caught my attention was the profile set up. While similar to other apps, it was just more exciting and able to capture more of your own personality. Once you click on my profile, you’ll immediately see a montage of my favorite memories with the song Counting by Hamdi and Princess Superstar (it’s a little cocky, I know, but the song is catchy!) and a bio stating, “welcome to the chaos” – short and sweet but yours can be up to 100 characters. I adore the use of emojis, music and a bio. The multiple ways to alter your profile is a great way for your personality to shine through on this platform. 

One of the most tedious aspects of the app is the “Darkroom.” Lapse’s darkroom is a section of the app where your photos “develop” similar to a disposable camera. Lapse’s darkroom holds your photos for an unspecified length of time until you receive a notification that your photos have developed. Until then, you have no idea what your photo looks like, which adds a sense of nostalgia I appreciate. I found that the delayed development process helped me focus less on getting that perfect photo and rather capture raw images of memories I wanted to savor, removing any editing from pictures and even captions. 

While I had thought this app was initially a spam text, I was partially correct. The sign-up process felt as such. Unlike other social media platforms where you only need an email, username, and password, Lapse, in addition to those requirements, also forces you to send the invite to five contacts on your phone before they open the gates of Lapse to you. It was a hassle to send it to friends. It got a bit finicky, as my immediate friends were already on the app and I couldn’t send it to them. However, Lapse, in a recent update, has done away with this feature so you can easily access Lapse without recruiting five friends to join you. 

For me, Lapse is still a great way to curb the app-etite for posting on social media without second guessing if a picture is “post-worthy” or will get enough likes because it is an app consisting of “friends, not followers,” as the app’s slogan states. While it is definitely an app that has entered my rotation of apps to scroll through in my free time, it is not an app designed to steal your screen time. I found Lapse to be a great place to share photos with friends that I didn’t necessarily want to be on my Instagram page.  

Lapse celebrates the memories you want to capture without putting them in a public media environment. It places the social back into social media… as long as you can convince five friends to join with you first.