Who it’s for:
Supposedly dreamt up as a way to send nudes, Snapchat has evolved into a full-blown social media platform where users can share all kinds of content with their followers.
Even though it has a ton of other features, including videos and opportunities to meet new people, Snapchat still works as a great sexting app — and it’s free.
Why we picked this:
Snapchat has moved up the app food chain over the past 12 years, becoming a staple in the mainstream social media roster. We’d say it’s right up there with Facebook, Instagram, and even TikTok. According to the Associated Press, there are approximately 406 million active users on the app daily, and more than 7 million Snapchat+ subscribers.
The app’s core functionality allows you to send anything you want (naughty images, sexy voice messages, or a private text message), and it’ll vanish as soon as the recipient opens it. Users can choose a time limit of 1 to 10 seconds or the “infinity” option, which lets your recipient view a photo for as long as they want before they close out of it. And, like the other apps on this list, Snapchat sends screenshot notifications, so you can send bae a brief glimpse of the goods without worrying if they’re secretly showing it to others behind your back.
This month, the app announced that it’ll be releasing even more features. You’ll soon be able to edit chats for five minutes after sending, express yourself with emoji reactions, and get reminders through “My AI Reminders.” Plus, new AI Lenses are coming, including a ’90s-themed lens, which makes me sad—were the ’90s really that long ago? Is my childhood nothing but a nostalgic free-for-all, a soon-to-be Halloween costume for today’s youth?
Despite its features and ephemeral nature, Snapchat poses some risk, especially if you’re in a hot-and-heavy conversation and accidentally send a snap to the wrong person or your story (*screaming*).
In addition to human error causing a potential disaster, Facebook and Mark Zuckerberg have been in the news for targeting Snapchat’s secrets through “Project Ghostbusters.” As Mashable reported, the project let Facebook decrypt Snapchat’s network traffic to get a competitive edge over the popular messaging app. Facebook couldn’t snoop on messages or photos, but the company used software on users’ smartphones to secretly measure Snapchat usage data.
Even though the actual project dates back to 2016, Project Ghostbusters was only recently revealed in documents unsealed as part of a class action lawsuit against Meta. So, if privacy is your top concern, just remember that sexting is only as secure as the platform you’re using — or the person on the other end of the conversation.