The ability to add another user as a friend on StoryGraph depends on their community settings. All of StoryGraph’s community features are opt-in, so the default setting for friends and buddy reads is ‘Nobody’.
These settings are customisable for each user via the Preferences page. Somebody who doesn’t want to engage with the social side of the app can choose to leave their settings as ‘Nobody can add me as a friend' and 'Nobody can invite me to buddy reads'.
If you don’t see the ‘Add friend’ or ‘Follow’ button on somebody’s profile, it means you don’t have permission to add them as a friend or follow them based on their community settings.
These settings can be adjusted at any time via the Preferences pages in the top right corner menu. If you know the person you’re trying to add in real life, you can give them a nudge to check their community settings via Preferences:
Once they’ve adjusted their settings, the ‘Add friend’ button should appear at the top right of their profile:
Please note that your profile’s privacy setting (private, community, public) does not come into play with friend requests.
If you’re looking to build a community on StoryGraph, the best way to do this is set your own community settings to ‘Anybody can add me as a friend’. Then share your profile link on your other social platforms. You will receive an in-app notification when someone sends you a friend request, and you have full control over who you accept or reject as a friend. Once you accept a friend request, you and the user will be automatically following one another.
The ability to block other StoryGraph users will be coming soon.