Making friends as an expat family in Barcelona usually happens in three places: the school gate, the neighbourhood square after school, and one regular activity your children do every week with local children. Most families say it takes the best part of the first school year to feel settled, and that it goes faster once the parents, not only the children, have a reason to see the same people every week.
The school decides a lot more than you think
Your choice of school shapes your social life in Barcelona more than your choice of flat.
In a state school (escola pública) or a state-funded private school (escola concertada), lessons are mainly in Catalan, with Spanish and English as subjects. Your children will be surrounded by local families, and within a few months most younger children pick up the language at a speed that will embarrass you. The parents' association, called the AFA (Associació de Famílies d'Alumnes), runs after-school activities, the school party and plenty of committees. Joining one is the quickest way for a parent to meet other parents.
International schools work differently. Many are in the upper neighbourhoods, such as Sarrià-Sant Gervasi and Pedralbes, or in towns like Sant Cugat and Castelldefels. You will meet families from a dozen countries, which is reassuring in the first months. The downside is that classmates may live far apart, so play dates need a car or a long metro ride, and many families leave after two or three years.
Neither choice is wrong. If you want local friends, though, a local school does most of the work for you.
Making friends as an expat family in Barcelona starts at the school gate
The school gate in Barcelona is busy at around 4.30pm, when most primary schools finish (times vary by school). Parents and grandparents wait outside, children pour out, and nobody goes straight home. They walk, slowly, to the nearest square or playground. Follow them.
Introduce yourself to two or three families from your child's class, not the whole year group. Join the school parents' group if the class has one and say who you are in a line. Then say yes to every birthday party in the first term, even the ones in a soft play centre on a Saturday morning. Spanish and Catalan children's parties often invite the whole class, and parents stay. It is the closest thing Barcelona has to a parents' evening with drinks.
The plaça after school
Barcelona's social life with children happens outdoors and late. Between about 5pm and 8pm, the squares (places) fill with children on scooters, footballs bouncing off church walls, and parents on benches with a coffee or a beer from the bar on the corner.
Some squares and parks where this happens every afternoon:
- Plaça de la Virreina and Plaça del Sol in Gràcia
- Plaça de la Concòrdia in Les Corts
- Parc de la Ciutadella, near the Born and the zoo
- Jardins del Turó del Putxet, in Sant Gervasi, on a hill with a playground
- Parc de l'Espanya Industrial, near Sants station
- Rambla del Poblenou, with its benches and play areas
Pick the one closest to home or school and go at the same time three or four days a week. By the second week you will recognise faces. By the fourth, somebody will ask your name.
One regular activity, every week
This is the step most expat families skip, and it is the one that turns acquaintances into friends. A weekly activity puts your children and you next to the same people at the same time, without anyone having to arrange anything.
Good options in Barcelona include a local sports club (football, basketball and swimming clubs are everywhere), music or dance school, and the casals, the holiday camps run by community centres and schools during school breaks. Summer casals are where many children of incomers make their first Catalan-speaking friends.
Then there are the castellers. Barcelona's human-tower teams welcome new members of every age, and children are essential: the smallest climb to the very top. Families train together on weekday evenings and perform at neighbourhood festivals. Teams such as the Castellers de la Vila de Gràcia are open to anyone willing to turn up.
Learn a bit of Catalan, even if you never master it
You can live in Barcelona in Spanish and English. But your children will learn Catalan at a state school, the AFA meetings and the school notices will often be in Catalan, and parents notice who makes the effort.
The Consorci per a la Normalització Lingüística runs Catalan courses for adults across the city. Basic levels have usually been free; check the current terms on its website. Even a few months of classes changes how the school gate feels.
Use the library and the neighbourhood festivals
The Biblioteques de Barcelona network has a library in almost every neighbourhood, and most run storytimes (l'hora del conte) and workshops for young children, many of them free. They are in Catalan or Spanish, but toddlers don't mind, and the parents sitting next to you live round the corner.
Every neighbourhood also has its Festa Major, its local festival. The best known is the Festa Major de Gràcia in August, when residents decorate entire streets, but Sants, Les Corts and Poblenou have their own, with children's activities, communal meals and correfocs (fire runs) that older children love. Volunteer for something small, such as setting up tables. People remember who helped.
Which neighbourhoods make it easier
Some areas feel more like a village than others.
Gràcia has busy squares, a strong local identity and lots of young families. Sant Gervasi and Sarrià are quieter, greener and popular with international schools, so you will find both local and expat families. Poblenou has a growing number of young families, the beach and the long Rambla. Les Corts is residential and practical, with schools, parks and the Camp Nou nearby.
What to expect in the first year
Expect the first term to feel slow. Spanish and Catalan families often have grandparents nearby and a social circle from their own school days, so they are not always looking for new friends. The family you chat to every Tuesday by the swings in October is the one who invites you to lunch in March.
Lunch, by the way, starts at around 2pm at weekends and can last until 5pm. If you are invited, eat a small breakfast and plan nothing for the afternoon. And when you invite someone back, a picnic in the park or a meal on a terrace works just as well as a meal at home. Many local families prefer meeting outside.
If you would like to meet families with children near you, My City on Woltica lets you see families in your area for free. Writing to a family outside your school or organisation for the first time costs 1 credit, refunded if they don't reply within 72 hours, and you can arrange a meet-up in a park or a square. Find out more at Woltica.