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How Often Does the Best Friends Data Update in Snapchat?

How Often Does the Best Friends Data Update in Snapchat?

Snapchat is one of the most popular messaging and image sharing apps on the App Store today, thanks to its unique twist: snaps disappear shortly after being seen or read. This focus on keeping photos, videos, and messages temporary and disposable helps keep things quick and casual, rather than requiring you to keep a lengthy, complete archive of a serious conversation. Since its debut in 2011, Snapchat has added a ton of new features, regularly overhauling the app and updating older features to stay relevant. One of the most popular features in Snapchat is the Best Friends list, an algorithm-driven selection of your friends on the app, chosen on the basis of how often you engage with them.

Best Friends rolled out as a feature in 2016, and it’s undergone some changes since then, including changing your friends’ Best Friends data to private. One question many Snapchat users have brought up is what the frequency is for the Best Friends algorithm to update your list. Does a giant mainframe somewhere run a batch job once a day? Or what? In this article, I will explain how often the Best Friends data updates in Snapchat, as well as discussing several other aspects of this feature.

What is the Best Friends Feature?

Your Best Friends in Snapchat are your friends with whom you interact the most. Sending a snap, receiving a snap, or participating in a group chat together all increase your interaction score. Snapchat’s algorithm then puts all your friends in order of their level of interaction with you, and your top contacts are listed on the app as your best friends. If you have relatively few friends on Snapchat, or don’t talk to your friends very often, then you may not have any Best Friends at all, or only have one or two.

At most, eight of your contacts can be listed as your best friends. Snapchat only looks at the last week or so when it calculates your Best Friends list, so you can’t just exchange a thousand messages with someone one day and expect them to stay on your friends list forever. Although they may appear there for a moment, they’ll eventually fall off as your contact with them dwindles to zero.

If you’re looking for your list of Best Friends, you can find it once you’re sending a snap at the very top of your full contacts list. You may also notice that some of your best friends have small emojis next to each name, which indicate a special reward they currently hold. There’s no shortage of emojis you’ll find in this list, and you can even customize them in your settings menu. If you’re looking for some of them, you’ll see emojis like these.

  • A yellow heart is for Snapchat Best Friends.
  • A red heart is for your BFF, which is a best friend for two weeks.
  • Two pink hearts is for two months, where the person becomes your ‘Super BFF’.
  • A grin emoji is for someone you share as a best friend with someone else.
  • A smirk emoji is for when you’re their best friend but they aren’t yours.
  • A smiley is for those second and third Snapchat Best Friends.
  • Sunglasses emoji means you share a best friend with someone else.
  • The fire emoji is for a Snapchat Best Friend you’re on a Snapstreak with.

These can be edited to appear exactly how you like, with your own custom emojis, just from entering the settings menu and selecting “Manage” under “Additional Options.”

How Often does Snapchat Best Friends Update?

Snapchat hasn’t publicly specified how often the algorithm runs, but the app seems to be updating all the time. A single message can lead to an immediate change in your Best Friends list as a consequence, as can forgetting to send a message to someone within just hours of receiving it. That said, the app also seems to update more frequently after being forced closed on your phone, so don’t be surprised if you miss out on viewing an update after sending a message. Depending on your use history with the app, for those data changes to actually change your Best Friends list results may take some time.

For example, if you have relatively few friends with whom you chat only occasionally, then sending and receiving a few messages with one person could make a major change in that person’s standing on the Best Friends list, which could cause the list to change. On the other hand, if you have hundreds or thousands of friends and send snaps and chats all day, then it will take many messages before there are any big changes in your list.

How Can I See My Best Friend List?

From the Home page, tap on the Friends button (the little chat balloon in the lower left). Then tap the Send To button (the little chat balloon in the upper right). Your Best Friends list will be at the top of your friends list, right above your Recents list. You can also get to the Best Friends list by taking a snap, then tapping the blue arrow at the bottom right of the screen to go to your Friends page, where they will have their own section.

Is It Possible to Arrange My Best Friends List?

Unfortunately, everything in Snapchat’s friends list is designed automatically using an algorithm, so unlike the old MySpace Top Friends list, you can’t control who shows up here. The easiest way to modify and add people to your list is to put in the work to keep sending things to the people you want to connect to. Spamming photos or videos—and getting spammed back in return—is by far the easiest way to get the people you want on your friends list there, even if it won’t necessarily be in a perfect order.

Snapchat’s Best Friends is one of the many neat features of the app that keeps things simple and effective. If you want to know just who you interact with most on Snapchat, now you know how!

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17 thoughts on “How Often Does the Best Friends Data Update in Snapchat?”

Clive says:
A best friend and I haven’t been in contact whatsoever for the past two weeks, yet he is still #2 on my list and his score actively goes up quite a lot each day and I also am in contact with multiple people daily. How is this possible?
Angel says:
I’ve been number one best friends with someone for 62 days which is a day or 2 over 2 months but we arent super bff’s yet? Why?
Himekou says:
I had a bestie symbol after 5 days of just sending snaps to a close friend of mine, how does that work??
I used a temp-mail.org to make account says:
You snapped with them a lot, and they snapped with you a lot. You got to the top of each others lists.
Kaila Bontempo says:
Had a smiley emoji for days after talking to someone i hadnt in awhile, which is normal. 6 days later, with no further contact, i have a yellow bestie emoji with them. I havent been on snap in the last 5 days so how does it change to that? I rarely have anything but smileys.
Kaitlyn says:
My friend messaged me on Snapchat lastnight and we had a conversation of six entry’s he used to be my bestfriend on snap we used to snap all the time but we haven’t snapped in a while before lastnight can this happen?
Crystal says:
If I have the grimacing face with a friend which means we have the same best friend if the best friend deletes them does that go away?
Jeff says:
I don’t snap many people besides my gf, so when one of my friends appeared with the emoji mutual BFF (sunglasses emoji). Is it safe to assume my gf and him have been snap chatting?
William Bjerre says:
yes
Tera says:
Yes but maybe no…my best friend has had a grimace face for months next to a guy I like. This tells her that he and I are best friends but…he has never once had me as his bestfriend so this is flawed….
Shannan says:
I have the super bffs heart with someone and they told me we share a best friend but no other emoji shows next to their name apart from the hearts, is that normal? Or should it still show the emoji with sunglasses? Confused
Jeremiah says:
What do I do my bestfriend list has disappeared and yet the people are there but the list is gone…
Em says:
Question. can you have 5 best friends on snap and one open spot? Because you only talk to 5 people. Or do you have to delete someone for that open spot to come? My bf has an open spot on his best friend list sometimes.
William Bjerre says:
You have to delete someone for the sixth spot to get empty (block or delete)
Mindy says:
This happen to me today, did it ever go back to the pink heart?
Kayleigh says:
My friend and I had a badge of being each other’s best friends for two weeks. Then it changed to just being each other’s number 1 best friend but neither of our best friend lists changed. Does anyone know why this would happen?
Chloe says:
I had the SAME EXACT thing happen to me today as well!!! My boyfriend and I had the Super BFF hearts, and they disappeared, but we are still each other’s BFF on the app. My theory is that something on Snapchat got messed up— perhaps an update or something or a change to the best friends list algorithm which could have messed with people’s best friend badges. I thought it was only me but seeing that you have had the same issue on the same day must mean Snapchat messed something up.
Sarafina Rene says:
This happened to me today as well…after being Super BFFs for over 2 years.
Jenn says:
This happened to me today too! I’m so annoyed!
Joris says:
How the hell is it that when I deleted someone earlier and they were on my best friends list, they would reappear in my best friends list but now when I delete someone and they are on my best friends list they just disappear from the best friends list how ling does it take for them to reappear usually?
Sam kajanka says:
So I was super besties with someone for 4 months but then stopped being their #1 for like 2 days. She’s back to being my #1 and I was wondering if it’ll just change back to super besties or do I have to wait the full 2 months again
Brittney Joan Waine says:
This happened to me and my partner and I can’t work out why?
Paul Hayes says:
My best friends list went from 8 to 6 on Friday. Why did this happen? I did not block or delete anyone. I haven’t been snapping a lot
Alana says:
If you haven’t been snapping all 8 of your best friends consistently (every day or every other day,) they eventually drop off your list.
Sally says:
Question. So my best friend on Snapchat recently supposedly blocked someone off Snapchat who was once one of their best friends. She had the emoji. My best friend said he deleted her but she still has the emoji by her name. I think he’s lying about deleting her just because she still has the emoji by her name but i don’t want to assume. It’s been 5 days and it’s still there. How long does it typically take for that emoji to go away?
Amanda says:
Lmao I’m in the exact same situation does anyone know the answer?
Janam Vaidya says:
Out of this 8 best friends, if none of them have a yellow heart with me, which of these 8 is my #1 best friend
Samuel Sui says:
Top of the list is your #1 best friend, but you’re not their best friend

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Robert Hayes

May 31, 2021

Robert is a freelance editor and writer living in Colorado.

132 Articles Published

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