Is solo polyamory the most feminist dating trend right now?
The 2020s were marked by alternatives. When a pandemic struck at the end of the decade, it not only uprooted the world order, it also reordered it. The world as we knew it – and its structures – has changed. And relationships were no exception.
An OECD study found that marriage rates declined by an average of 20% across 32 OECD countries in 2020. For singles in India, a 2023 Bumble survey found that around 60% of single Indians consider non-monogamy ethics (including open relationships and polygamy) as the best solution. way of the future. At the heart of the move away from traditional relationship structures is women’s agency – financial, emotional and sexual. And with their combined powers emerges the Captain Planet of relationship trends for 2025: solo polyamory.
A solo polyamorous, in the simplest definition, is someone who maintains multiple intimate relationships with people, but lives an independent lifestyle. Essentially, they don’t live with partners, don’t share finances, and don’t have the desire to reach the traditional relationship milestones that make their lives more intertwined with their partner’s. It can be a permanent or temporary lifestyle choice, but when you’re in it (regardless of how many partners you have), you are, fundamentally, “independent.”
It took a certain degree of trial and error for Poorna T, 37 and divorced, to find her way to solo polyamory. She married her high school sweetheart when she was 23, and after nine years of growing discomfort with monogamy, she realized she wanted out. “I like having my own life and I always thought it had to be one or the other: being single or in a ‘serious’ relationship,” she says. Poorna didn’t even realize she was a solo polyamorous until a friend in an open marriage pointed it out to her. “She said it casually one day at brunch, in 2021, when I mentioned feeling guilty about dating two people. Monogamy was so deeply programmed into me that I hadn’t even considered the idea that multiple relationships could work in a healthy way. Four years later, with two partners in her city and one remotely, Poorna has managed to find emotional fulfillment as well as her own space.
Amira G, 26, is new to this field. Polyamory and solo polyamory are fairly nascent concepts in her life, but she finds herself embracing them. “My friends always called me a serial monogamist because, until last year, I hadn’t been single since I was 15.” But after the end of her last relationship (“on good terms”, she adds hastily, so as not to see it as a reaction of recoil), she decided to explore other structures. “I currently only have one main partner and I date casually. But whatever direction this relationship or any new relationship forms, I love the independence of that structure. His life is busy with work, friends, boxing training three times a week and his cat Bingus. “I tend to get lost in my relationships. This contributed to this not happening.
