On May 9, TLC*, a 28-year-old digital strategist and student astrologer in Brooklyn, and her husband, Harry, a 28-year-old product manager, celebrated their five-year anniversary at home marathoning their favorite film series. They also exchanged five gifts, to signify five years together — an effort that would have made for perfect couples' content. But online, TLC only shared one portion of the day — a discrete Instagram story with an image of a cake that read "TLC & Harry 5 Years."
The couple met in 2019, became official a couple months later, and married in 2022. Unlike most social media users who provide a clear timeline of their relationship with photos and accompanying captions on their profiles, TLC doesn't have a single post of her husband on her Instagram grid. Not even her engagement or wedding photos made the cut. In fact, there's no way to confirm what Harry looks like by browsing through her page.
TLC and Harry "no-launched" their relationship, and an increasing number of couples on social media are opting to do the same.
What is a no-launch on Instagram?
A "no-launch" is exactly how it sounds — not launching your relationship online.
"There's definitely a misconception that everyone who's more reserved about their relationship on social media is doing that from a place of shame or deceit," says TLC. But she tells me, that isn't the case at all for her relationship. When she and Harry first became an item, TLC was working as a social media strategist in the music industry — a job that garnered a lot of attention online. Harry made it clear that he didn't want to be actively posted on her social media, to avoid outside voices sharing an opinion about their union. "When I am private about my relationship and protective of my partner online, I feel like I am honoring his wish that he not be a character in my silly little universe," she says.
This was the same case for Sarah Bahbah, a 32-year-old artist and director in Los Angeles. Her now ex-boyfriend didn't have any social media because he was skeptical of the surveillance that comes with being a person online. "I didn't want to post him on there because I wanted to be respectful of his beliefs," she said. But between possessing an Instagram account of one million followers and sharing personal art online, keeping her relationship off Instagram was also a decision of her own. "I already give the online world so much of my heart and my art. I didn't want the relationship to be public because I wanted something for myself," she says.
The practice of not posting your partner at all differs from the more popular versions of relationship launching like hard-launching and soft-launching. Instead of posting a photo dump dedicated to your partner, or sharing discrete photos of them to your grid or story, you don't post them at all. Celebrities have been doing it for years — with paparazzi sightings and red carpet attendances being the only way to confirm their relationship status. Think Timothée Chalamet and Kylie Jenner or Sabrina Carpenter and Barry Keoghan — both couples who've been spotted together everywhere except for each others' Instagram grids.
"I already give the online world so much of my heart and my art. I didn't want the relationship to be public because I wanted something for myself."
"This isn't a new concept. People have been doing this since the beginning of relationships, where they maybe [didn't] want to share private or intimate aspects of their personal life with other people," says Adelle Kelleher, a certified dating and relationship coach in Los Angeles and founder of Coaching Hearts Consulting. "I think the trend of posting less is healthier and more positive towards relationships."
Dishonest or discrete?
Opting for a no-launch often causes other people to assume the person withholding their partner is cheating or acting with ill intentions, says Kelleher, who adds, that isn't the main reason couples do it. Pressure from family to get married, disapproval from loved ones, and public scrutiny are a few reasons someone might decide to keep their relationship offline.
"Sharing your relationship online adds a different and new level of commitment because then you become accountable,” Kelleher says. "If your friends know about the relationship, then they're going to want updates and know how things are going. But if you don't have that accountability, it takes away a lot of extra pressure and unnecessary stress on you and the relationship."
Bahbah agrees: "I think the less people know the better because it allows you to process your relationship at your own time and in private. It's important to grow away from the internet and not rely on public opinion and public glorification of your relationship in order for it to thrive." The theory is two-fold: Our subconscious minds are hardwired to judge people, therefore fueling followers to form ideas about what someone posts. Also, humans are social animals by nature, causing us to care about what others think of us. Ultimately, we want to belong and be accepted. Having your relationship or partner scrutinized or glorified, as Bahbah says, can be invasive in a relationship.
Don't post until it's serious
According to Kelleher, a no-launch is a great idea for a new relationship that is still trying to find its own foundation. "The more people you invite into the relationship, the more people have opinions and will say things to you that could get in your way," she says. Eliminating any opportunity for outside opinions during the beginning stages of a relationship, Kelleher says, allows you to have a better understanding of your authentic feelings.
Ultimately, when opening up your intimate and private life to a segment of the population that you only might know, that isn't your inner circle of trusted friends and family, you invite in other people's opinions and pressures. When the thoughts are mean or disapproving, we're more likely to give them attention. "It's hard not to let others' thoughts feed you ideas that might cloud your own judgment — even if it's subconscious," says Kelleher.
Sharing positive moments of your relationship online is not completely bad, Kelleher adds, but should be held for established, long-term, committed relationships. "As milestones occur within the relationship, it can be really fun sharing that with more of the social world, or even your friends and family that are not close in distance," she says. "I think that if you're going to include someone, let's say on your grid or on social media, it should be someone that you know is going to be sticking around for a substantial amount of time," says Kelleher.
"I think so many people have had their heart broken from publicly launching their partners, and then breaking up and then everyone knowing that you've broken up," says Bahbah, who feels grateful that she didn't post about her most recent breakup.
Privacy is the new black
The trend is indicative of a wider shift towards using social media in a way that seems much more private and aloof. Gone are the days of adopting vibrant aesthetics and having hundreds of grid posts. Instead, photo dumps and blank profiles have made the platform effortless and lowkey. In an interview with NPR, Kim Garcia, a Meta representative, shared that younger Instagram users have an aversion to permanence and digital footprints, and are using the app more discreetly.
Perhaps younger social media users have been able to witness the harms of oversharing online from their predecessors. Whether it be deleted photos resurfacing the web or cringey tweets emerging from years before, being private on public platforms produces a level of safety for social media users. "It comes down to just wanting this part of your life to be private. People are obsessed with social media now, everything is online, and I think that is something that can be very intrusive in a relationship," Bahbah says.
Another bonus of no-launching: authenticity. "When you're spending time with your partner, you don't want to be spending time with the intention to capture everything to put online eventually," Bahbah says. To that, TLC adds: "Harry and I are partners in real life and nothing that I could share with an online audience could ever compare to what we have in person."
* Source requested this name for privacy reasons.
UPDATE: Jun. 4, 2024, 10:00 a.m. EDT This article has been updated to reflect a name change for privacy reasons.
Topics Social Media
