Imagine you are with friends. As you chat and simply hang out with your fellow companions, the conversation slowly dies down. Then someone shouts, “OMG it’s time to BeReal!” Everybody’s racing to take out their phones. Your friend holds up the camera, somehow they are taking a selfie and group photo at the same time?! What is this?? Well, simply put it’s the social media app BeReal. 

After a decade of social media giants like Instagram and Snapchat dominating the internet social scene, the French social media app BeReal slowly made its ascent to the mainstream. Originally released in 2020, BeReal gained popularity with the masses in 2022. With the promise of erasing the “fakeness” of today’s social media, BeReal has an interface to support their mission. At a random time of day (could be ten in the morning or ten at night), BeReal sends out a notification to all users that they have up to 2 minutes to take a picture of what they are currently doing. Hence, the urgency of the “it’s time to BeReal” yell. But it is no ordinary picture. The app uses both the selfie lens and the back lens to capture both the user and their surroundings. If one misses the chance to post during the 2 minute window, BeReal does not hesitate to call the user out. Resulting in a notification to the user’s friends that they posted late. Users can also react to other people’s BeReals, similar to liking an Instagram post through RealEmojis. 

The response to the app has been positive so far. Many people enjoy catching up with friends randomly throughout the day. Some critics of the app say that it focuses on the mundane of everyday life. But with random 2 minute windows that change day to day, BeReal never fails to catch something crazy that may be happening. It is clear people are ready for the transition to more “real” and “grounded” social media apps as BeReal has 10 million active daily users and the app itself won Apple’s App of the Year award. 

With that being said, ⚠️“It’s time to BeReal!”⚠️