If you haven’t yet heard of BeReal yet (which we’re 99.9% sure you have), it’s the latest social platform focused on driving more “realistic” updates on our lives with no filters and no do-overs without outing our second take to the world. Seventy-one percent of Gen Z think that filtered social media posts affect how they see themselves, so BeReal took this into their own hands and decided to create a platform that stands against the negativity. But does it?

BeReal notifies your phone with a two minute warning to take a picture of what you’re doing in that exact moment. If you don’t take the picture within two minutes, your time is up and you have to wait until tomorrow to get your chance again, or face the fact everyone knows you’ve posted late. This is supposed to remove the process of waiting for the perfect lighting, perfect makeup and perfect hair - allowing us to just post our ‘natural selves’ for the world to see.

With any new social platform, it takes a while to get going. But once someone we know uses it, we HAVE to join and see what the fuss is about. With a boom of 2.93 million daily active users in April 2022, up 29,200% from the previous year, it’s no wonder press everywhere have covered the topic.

BUT WHAT IS THE POINT?

We’re all guilty of downloading the latest app, using it a few times and abandoning it to collect cyber dust in our phone, using storage we need but refusing to delete *just incase*. My question is, why?

We feel that downloading every new social app will bring us a sense of enjoyment and fulfilment - essentially ensuring we’re not left behind. It’s a toxic cycle many of us can’t break. BeReal promotes the realistic aspect of a social media platform, but I’m here to debunk that theory and tell you exactly why BeReal is not real.

FIRST, LET’S COMPARE THE PLATFORMS:

Instagram is a highlight reel, sharing our every moment with filters and perfectly timed ‘candids’. It’s curated perfection to put it shortly.

TikTok has replaced vine to be our daily escape overflowing with comedy and perfect feeds, filled with related content to our likes. Plus, who doesn’t want to be a TikToker right now?

YouTube is still our go-to for long form content, with TikTok close behind. We can take a look into our favourite influencers daily lives with no limit to their sharing (or so it feels).

Finally, we get to BeReal (sorry Facebook), which times your posts to share every day with the world. But something doesn’t feel quite right…

WHY BEREAL ISN’T REAL

I have to be honest, when the buzz around BeReal hit the news, I took to the app store to download immediately. But I was instantly met with a feeling of disappointment. I didn’t get the hype.

BeReal set out to create a social media app that stands against the damaging impact of the others and yet here we all were, sitting waiting for the ping of the notification, scrolling through the feed until it happens… I can’t help but wonder, was this really the ‘exciting’ new platform I had been missing out on?

If anything, I found I spent longer on my phone than ever before, scrolling through other BeReals wondering how much was really real. If you jumped on the notification as it came through, this meant you had exactly 2 minutes to get ready and take the picture - what can you do in 2 minutes? Brush your hair, curl your eyelashes, put on concealer or maybe even get changed. Creating unnecessary competition between friends on who’s having the most fun each day. To be honest, it seemed exhausting.

At the end of the day, BeReal is still a social media platform, and with social media comes pressure. As much as we’d love to have a more organic platform for real people and real life experiences, BeReal puts pressure on posting every single day, and if you haven’t then there’s obviously nothing good enough to share right? Wrong. Just because we’re not all active 24/7 on our social media apps, does not mean that we have nothing going on in our lives.

Why are we so set on sharing our life experiences instead of living them?

To be real ;), it wasn’t the social media platform for me, I’m going to stick with my basics this time. But remember, just because it glitters, it’s not always gold. Put your mental health first, it’s the best thing you can do.

Are you a fan of BeReal? Let’s discuss.