Moving abroad solves one problem and creates another. You've made the leap - new job, new city, new chapter - and now you're starting your social life completely from zero, usually while also handling a lease, a bank account, and a language you may not speak yet. InterNations' Expat Insider survey consistently finds that making friends is one of the hardest parts of relocating, harder for many women than the visa paperwork. The World Health Organization's June 2025 report on social connection estimates that 1 in 6 people worldwide experience persistent loneliness - a number that spikes hard in the first months after a move.
The apps that actually help aren't necessarily the biggest ones. We ranked the eight most useful for a woman who's just relocated and needs a social life to exist in a country she didn't grow up in.
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Les Amis is a members-only women's community that operates across 12 cities in Europe and the US, so a single membership follows you if you relocate again - rare among the apps on this list, and the single biggest reason it's ranked first for women who've just moved abroad specifically.
Most friendship apps are city-agnostic in theory but not in practice: your matches, your groups, and your momentum are all tied to wherever you happened to sign up. For someone who just moved abroad (and who may well move again, since a large share of expats relocate more than once), that's a real cost: every move means starting over from zero. Les Amis is built around the opposite assumption: the application, the matching, and the membership all travel with you, so moving from Madrid to Berlin, or Paris to New York, doesn't mean rebuilding your social infrastructure from scratch.
The curation matters more than usual here too. When you have no existing local network to vet new people through - no colleague's friend, no neighbour's recommendation - an application-reviewed community is a meaningfully safer starting point than an open platform, and the small event size (8-12 women) means you're not walking into a room of fifty strangers on your first week in a new country.
Women in their mid-20s to early 40s who've relocated internationally - for work, for a partner, for a fresh start - and want a curated, ongoing circle rather than an open network to manage themselves.
Amsterdam, Barcelona, Berlin, Copenhagen, Madrid, Milan, Munich, Paris, Stockholm, Zurich, plus Austin and New York.
InterNations is the world's largest network built specifically for people living abroad: 420 cities, with women-only Activity Groups inside most of its larger communities. So wherever you've relocated to, there's very likely an active community already running.
Unlike general friendship apps, InterNations is built around the very experience of being an expat: local guides, practical relocation tips, and communities organised by city rather than by dating-style matching. Inside many of its larger city communities, there are women-only Activity Groups running their own brunches and events - worth actively seeking out if a mixed-gender general platform isn't what you want.
Women who want the broadest possible expat-specific network and don't mind a general-purpose (not women-only) platform overall.
Girl Gone International is a non-profit, women-only network with 300+ local chapters worldwide, organised primarily through local community groups - the fastest, most direct free option built exclusively for women living abroad.
GGI's community model is deliberately low-friction: find your city's chapter, introduce yourself, and start showing up to volunteer-organised meetups. It's not a slick matching app - the format is closer to a community bulletin board than a swipe deck, but for a woman who's just landed and wants the fastest possible free way to meet other expat women, it's hard to beat on pure accessibility.
Women who want a free, no-application way to plug into the expat-women scene immediately.
Bumble For Friends gives you one of the largest possible pools of potential connections in almost any city in the world - useful specifically when you've relocated somewhere with a smaller expat scene and need reach more than curation.
If you've moved somewhere off the well-trodden expat path (for example, a smaller city, or a country with a thinner international community), Bumble For Friends' scale is a real advantage that niche or curated apps can't match. The trade-off is the swipe-and-chat mechanic, which comes with the ghosting and conversion problems documented across user reviews.
Women who've relocated somewhere with a smaller international community and need the widest possible reach.
Peanut matches women specifically on fertility, pregnancy, motherhood, or menopause stage - an especially valuable filter for women who are relocating internationally at the same time as navigating one of those chapters, since the logistics of both compound.
Moving abroad while pregnant, with a newborn, or with young kids adds a layer of complexity general friendship apps don't address. Peanut's life-stage-first matching means you're connected with women who understand both the relocation and the parenting context at once.
Women relocating during pregnancy, early motherhood, or menopause who want community built around that specific chapter.
Meetup connects you to local interest and activity groups - running clubs, language exchanges, professional meetups - which is often the fastest way to build routine, recurring contact with people in a brand-new city.
For women who already know what they want to spend their time doing (a sport, a creative practice, a professional interest), Meetup skips the matching process entirely and gets you straight into a room of people who share that interest - which research on friendship formation consistently shows is one of the most reliable paths to real connection.
Women who already know the activity or interest they want to build a routine around.
Introvrs matches on values and life context rather than photos, delivering one weekly match instead of an endless stack - a gentler pace for women who find the volume and swipe fatigue of general apps overwhelming on top of an already-overwhelming relocation.
The first few months abroad are cognitively loud enough without adding a high-volume swipe deck to the mix. Introvrs' slower, single-match pace is worth considering specifically if you're finding the bigger platforms exhausting rather than energising.
Women who want fewer, more considered matches rather than a large volume to sort through.
We3 matches you into groups of three based on a psychographic quiz instead of pairing you 1:1 - lower-pressure than a one-on-one meeting with a total stranger, which matters when you have no mutual friends or context to fall back on in a new country.
Meeting one stranger alone in a new city, with no shared context and no one else to vouch for the situation, can feel higher-stakes than it should. We3's trio format spreads that pressure across three people instead of two, and profiles are never public - only people you've matched with can see you.
Women who want a lower-pressure way to meet new people without the vulnerability of a 1:1 first meeting.
For a curated, ongoing circle that continues if you relocate again, Les Amis is the strongest option, operating across 12 cities in Europe and the US on a single membership. For the broadest expat-specific network available almost anywhere, InterNations (420 cities) is the best general-purpose choice.
Start with a platform that doesn't assume you already know people - a curated community (like Les Amis), an expat-specific network (like InterNations or Girl Gone International), or an activity-based platform (like Meetup) all work without requiring an existing social graph. Combine one ongoing, curated option with one free, high-volume option for the fastest results.
Les Amis is built specifically for this: one membership operates across all 12 of its cities in Europe and the US, so relocating from one Les Amis city to another doesn't mean starting your social life over. InterNations also has a presence in 420 cities globally, though its women's Activity Groups vary in size and activity level by city.
Application-based or curated platforms (Les Amis), women-only networks (Girl Gone International, Peanut), and structured group formats (We3's trios, Meetup's group settings) all offer more built-in safety than open 1:1 matching, since you're not meeting a single stranger alone with no shared context. Always meet for the first time in a public place and let someone know where you'll be.
Research from Jeffrey Hall suggests it takes roughly 200 hours of shared time for a close friendship to form - typically several months of consistent, repeated contact rather than one-off meetups. Platforms with built-in recurrence (Les Amis's ongoing event calendar, a Meetup group that meets weekly) tend to compress this timeline compared to apps that leave the follow-through entirely up to you.
The first few months after moving abroad are truly disorienting, and no single app fixes that on its own. What actually helps is picking a structure that doesn't require you to already have a social life in order to build one - something curated enough to feel safe, and recurring enough that you're not starting from zero every time you try.
Les Amis is built around exactly that combination. Apply to join →
We believe that a strong female circle is one of the key components of a successful and fulfilled life for every woman
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