What Are We?

Situationship? The situation is that they don’t want you.

Every college student loves a good situationship: flirty, fun, and noncommittal. Unfortunately, they’re also a fast track to mixed signals, 2 a.m. overthinking, and heartbreak over someone you were never technically with. Situationships, or romantic and sexual relationships without clear labels or definitions, are increasingly popular among Gen Z. We’ve compiled a list of situationship tropes everyone knows (and hates).

Lesbian Who Is in Love with Her Ex-Girlfriend

One of them cheated, the other has issues with vulnerability—the perfect match! They went no contact over the summer but have been hanging out all of autumn. (Falling in love in October, anyone?) They both go on dates and flirt with other people, but they will keep reposting cryptic TikToks and sending each other sappy drunk texts. One is leading on an innocent bystander while debating whether to break no contact for the third time this month. No matter who they’re fucking, they are always wishing they were with each other, but that doesn’t mean they will stop seeing other people.

Guy Who Thinks He’s Batman x Girl Who Loves Hello Kitty

This one is infamous; in fact, Batman and Hello Kitty might be patient zero for situationships. This combination is always made up of the two worst people you know, plus all their emotional baggage. Even though they are not dating, they wear matching “I heart my bf/gf” pajamas. He is still seeing other girls (including his ex). Their TikTok reposts are excessively performative, and their Instagram notes always have matching, cringe-inducing songs. He has extreme trust issues from “past trauma” (his ex posted a bikini pic once without asking him), so he makes her send outfit pictures every day. She is obsessed with his ex even more than he is—she dyed her hair like hers. Even though she loves Lululemon, she’s retired her Scubas and Align leggings because they don’t match his preferred brand of “emo mommy” aesthetic. Despite her love for pink and bunnies, she now has a tramp stamp and a septum piercing.

Finance Bro x Manic Pixie Dream Girl

He wears Patagonia, she wears Pucci, but they are both New York trust fund babies. She has micro bangs and styles her $700 Isabel Marant wedge sneakers with wrinkled Shein tops (but in a unique, niche way that “you just wouldn’t understand”). He spends all day thinking about his future Goldman Sachs return offer and the first watch he’ll buy after. They watched “You Can See Everything” together and thought Elizabeth Holmes and Billy Evans were “relationship goals.” Manic Pixie Dream Girl posts blurry selfies of her and her man to Phoebe Bridgers’ music, but she is nowhere to be found on Finance Bro’s Instagram.

The College Girl with a High School Boyfriend

They met through a shared, competitive extracurricular, probably debate or Model UN. She writes sappy poetry about him in her Instagram highlights, as if it came out of a budget Bridgerton screenplay. The anniversaries they celebrate online are certainly … unique. You will catch a story about the first time they held hands, the first time they kissed, and the first time she farted in front of him. She brings him to her college events where he acts drunk after one vodka cran. He has promised to apply early but secretly wants to go to his state party school. And although she swears they have an amazing, healthy relationship, she still stays home from the MIT frats to apologize to him about her “revealing” outfit. Meanwhile, he struggles through his algebra homework.

Woke Juliet x Conservative Romeo

She is majoring in Social Studies because Government wasn’t “intersectional” enough. He is an Economics major and follows Ben Shapiro religiously. She reposts TikToks about current events, but if you ask her follow-up questions, she can’t answer. She identified as bisexual in middle school, but is now a proud “straight ally.” He has a far more adversarial perspective on the LGBTQ+ community; drag shows make him uncomfortable (or perhaps, turned on), and he refers to it as a “lifestyle,” but he does think it’s hot when girls kiss, so you will catch her performatively making out with her friends. She scolds him for saying slurs when he’s drunk, but they still hook up afterward. He typically lasts about three minutes, but he swears that doesn’t usually happen.

Two Friends Who Just Won’t Put a Label on It

They are in a large, mixed-gender, mixed-race friend group, with at least one other couple that is way more stable than they are. They are the same height, but he’s totally not insecure about it. Although she makes fun of him with the rest of the girls in the friend group, she consistently bails on group hangouts to spend time alone with him. But don’t worry—“it’s not what it looks like.” They also “jokingly” touch each other way too much. Despite showing up to multiple hangouts covered in hickeys, they are still iffy on the whole “what are we” of it all.

Girl Cracking Her TF

She just got out of a year-long relationship, is looking for some fun, and is finding it in her Gen-Ed section. Her TF is honestly only ranked third on her roster, but hooking up with one has been on her bucket list for a while now. She likes to act secretive and sneak them in and out of Adams House, but all of her friends (and all of their friends) know (because she tells them).

Athlete x Athlete

Teamcest is a classic. These two met at practice, and it was love at first sight. They have not put a label on it—partly to avoid scrutiny, but also because they are both still hooking up with other members of the team (messy!). You will see them sharing water from the same Owala after their morning runs—how romantic! Watch out for them speeding toward you while they share a scooter, arms entangled, ponytails flapping in the wind.

Whatever your relationship status, we sincerely hope you never experience any situationship of doom and despair. But if you do, we hope the sex is amazing.

Anika Gupta ’30 (anikagupta@college.harvard.edu) and Salma Gheith ’30 (salmagheith@college.harvard.edu) are situationship survivors.