findatime is a free social scheduling app that finds when you and your friends are both free. You mark your available hours each week, share a single link, and findatime automatically surfaces the times that overlap — so you can stop the back-and-forth of 'when are you free?' texts and just make the plan.

How do casual plans work on findatime?

Instead of polling a group chat, you post what you're up for — a gym session, a hike, a coffee — along with a time. Share it with a Group so the whole crew sees it at once. Friends who are free tap 'I'm Keen'. No RSVPs to chase, no one feels pressured.

Does findatime sync with my calendar?

No. findatime does not sync with Google Calendar, Outlook, or any calendar app. You manually mark the hours you're free each week, which takes about 30 seconds. Your contacts and calendar data stay completely private.

Can I use findatime to catch up with friends overseas?

Yes. findatime works across timezones. You mark your free hours in your local time, your friend marks theirs in their local time, and the app shows you the overlap in your own timezone — no mental math required.

Yes, findatime is free to use. Set your availability, share your link, and start making plans at no cost.

How is findatime different from a group chat?

Group chats require back-and-forth messages to find a time everyone's free. findatime eliminates that: you mark your availability once, share a link, and the app shows the overlap automatically. For casual plans, you post once and see who's keen — no chasing RSVPs.

Staying Connected to Friends in London When You're Always Working

The London paradox

London is a city of 9 million people, hundreds of pubs, and a social scene that runs seven nights a week. By any measure, it should be the easiest city in the world to maintain a social life.

And yet — ask any London professional in their late 20s or 30s, and you'll hear the same thing: "I have loads of friends, and I never see them."

The reason isn't lack of desire. It's that London combines three things that are uniquely toxic to friendship maintenance:

A demanding work culture. City hours, long commutes, and a "always on" professional norm that eats evenings and weekends.
Geographic spread. Your friend in Clapham, you in Hackney, your other friend in Ealing — a "quick drink" is a 45-minute Tube journey each way.
The "we must do drinks" trap. London's default social currency is the vague after-work drinks invitation, which is the highest-friction plan format there is: it requires you to be free the same evening, in the same part of the city, with enough energy left after work to actually go.

The result is a city full of people who intend to see their friends, say they'll see their friends, and then look up six months later and realise they haven't.

Why "we must do drinks" never happens

The phrase "we must do drinks" is the London equivalent of "let's grab a coffee sometime" — a social pleasantry that signals warmth without committing to anything. It's not dishonest; people mean it when they say it. But the format is broken:

It's open-ended. No time, no place, no date. Just a vibe.
It's evening-only. After a 10-hour day, the last thing most people want is to get back on the Tube for a 45-minute journey to a pub.
It's high-commitment. "Drinks" implies at least two hours, which in a busy week is a big ask.
It's geographically demanding. You need to find a pub that's "fair" to both of you, which usually means neither of you is near home.

So the "we must do drinks" text sits in your messages, warmly received, never acted on. Multiply by 15 friends, and you have a social life that exists entirely in theory.

The London-specific fixes

1. Replace "drinks" with "a walk"

The single highest-leverage change you can make in London is to replace the default social format. Instead of drinks in the evening — which is high-friction, high-commitment, and geographically demanding — propose a walk on a weekend morning.

London is one of the best walking cities in the world. Hampstead Heath, the South Bank, Regent's Canal, Hyde Park, Greenwich Park, the Thames Path — you're never more than 20 minutes from a genuinely beautiful walk. And a walk is:

Low-commitment. 45 minutes to an hour, not a whole evening.
Geographically flexible. You can meet somewhere that's easy for both of you.
Energy-restoring, not energy-depleting. You leave feeling better, not hungover.
Easy to make recurring. "First Saturday of the month" is a slot that survives busy seasons.

2. Use the lunch hour

London professionals guard their lunch hour less than they should. If you work in the City or Canary Wharf or central London, there's almost certainly a friend who works within a 15-minute walk. A 45-minute lunch catch-up — even just a walk and a Pret — maintains a friendship that an evening "drinks" never would.

The key is to make it recurring. Not "let's do lunch sometime" — "every other Tuesday, 12:30, the place by your office." The slot exists; you both show up. No negotiation.

3. Stop crossing the city for casual catch-ups

One of the biggest hidden costs of London friendship is travel. A friend in Clapham and you in Walthamstow means every catch-up is 90 minutes of travel for 60 minutes of socialising. That's a bad ratio, and it's why those catch-ups happen rarely.

For your casual friendships, accept the geography. Find friends who are local — within a 20-minute walk or a single Tube change. Save the cross-city journeys for your close friends, where the travel is worth it. You'll see your local friends weekly and your distant friends monthly, instead of seeing no one because every plan feels like a trek.

4. Make the plan, don't ask the question

The London "we must do drinks" text is a question disguised as a statement. Replace it with an actual plan: "I'm walking the Heath on Saturday at 10 — want to come?" It's a yes/no question, not an open-ended negotiation. Your friend can accept, decline, or counter — all of which are easier than "let me check my calendar and get back to you."

5. Share your availability, let the overlap find you

The deepest fix is to stop doing the scheduling negotiation entirely. Mark your free hours — the Saturday morning walk slot, the Tuesday lunch, the Thursday evening call window — share your link, and let your friends see when you're available. When there's an overlap, the plan emerges. No "when are you free?" text. No Tube-based guilt.

This is what findatime does. In a city where the scheduling tax is the thing that kills plans, removing the tax is the single biggest lever you have.

The London friendship audit

If you're a London professional and your social life feels theoretical, do this:

List your 8–10 closest London friends. Not acquaintances — people you genuinely want to see regularly.
Note where each one lives and works. The geography matters.
Identify the 3–4 who are geographically easy — within a 20-minute walk or a single Tube change of your home or office. These are your "weekly" friends.
Find one recurring slot for each of them — a walk, a lunch, a call. Put it in the calendar. Protect it.
For the geographically distant close friends, pick a monthly slot and accept the travel. One cross-city journey a month is sustainable; four is not.
Share your findatime link with all of them. Let the overlap find the rest.

The Londoners who keep their friendships aren't the ones with the most free time. They're the ones who've accepted that in this city, friendship is a logistics problem — and they've built a system to solve it.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is London really lonelier than other cities?

The data says yes, disproportionately so. London consistently ranks among the loneliest cities in UK surveys, despite (or because of) its size and pace. The combination of demanding work, geographic spread, and a transient population makes it uniquely hard to maintain friendships.

How do I make friends in London if I'm new?

Recurring activities — run clubs, climbing gyms, classes. London has an incredible infrastructure of recurring social activities. The key is the recurring part: one-off events don't build friendships; showing up to the same thing every week does.

What if all my friends are in different parts of the city?

That's normal — London is huge. The answer is to tier your friendships: local friends for weekly contact, cross-city friends for monthly. Don't try to see everyone every week; you'll burn out and see no one.

How do I maintain friendships when I'm working 60+ hour weeks?

This is exactly when a system matters most. If you have no free time, the scheduling negotiation is the thing that kills the plan. Mark the one or two slots you do have, share them, and let the overlap find you. One walk a week maintains a friendship; zero catch-ups because "I'm too busy to schedule" lose it.