Best Volunteer Abroad Opportunities to Make Friends in 2025/26

You’ve heard it time and time again: volunteering is a life-changing experience that offers so many benefits for you and the community you help. You’ll make memories, develop and hone your skills, and meet new people to remember for the rest of your life. This once-in-a-lifetime opportunity is within your reach. 

But what about when you’re going alone? Spending weeks or months away from home can be daunting, especially when you’re solo travelling and staying with a host family you’ve never met before. 

Don’t worry - most people you’ll be working with are in the same boat as you. Keep reading to find the best volunteer opportunities to make friends, and how to make the most of your solo travelling experience. 

Why Making Friends is Important While Volunteering

Making friends isn’t the main goal of volunteering, but it’ll make your experience much more worthwhile and meaningful! Temporarily moving to another country on your own can be slightly daunting, but the magical thing about volunteering is that most of the people in your group will be in the exact same position as you, making it easier to make friends and build strong connections. 

One key motivator for volunteering abroad is the idea of making connections with people from all over the world. Meeting people from various walks of life who have different perspectives and ideas from you can help you see other points of view and make it easier to connect with others in the future. 

Making friends while volunteering isn’t essential, but it’s highly recommended to help you feel at ease in another country. Looking for group volunteering opportunities is the quickest way to find like-minded people in your new community. 

Women’s Empowerment

Nothing creates unbreakable bonds between people than a sense of deep-rooted community, compassion and understanding. Volunteering in women’s empowerment does exactly that, letting you meet people from all walks of life to come together for one worthy cause. 

Women's empowerment volunteering programs are required all over the world, so you’re spoilt for choice when it comes to where to lend a helping hand! Places like Morocco, Sri Lanka and Nepal all have women empowerment opportunities, along with Argentina, Tanzania, and India.  

Several education opportunities are also available, including Ghana’s Girls Teaching Program and the Girl Education Program in Jaipur. Experiencing the hardships local communities face on a daily basis can be incredibly insightful and eye-opening, and it’s not uncommon for volunteers to bond while leaning on each other for support. 

Community Development

Being able to stand back and look at something you had a hand in creating - whether that be building a new school, renovating a medical clinic, or a new community program to inspire and challenge young minds - is an amazing bonding exercise. Join opportunities like Jaipur’s Construction and Renovation Project or the Community Development Project in Barcelona to make a worthy difference in countries that don’t have the resources for sustainable development alone. 

Volunteers who focus on community development often spend their entire journey together, working towards one common goal rather than assisting many different teams for short periods of time. This shared experience is a wonderful opportunity to make friends that you’ll remember for a lifetime. 

Conservation

Conservation is one of the most popular volunteer opportunities at Volunteering Solutions, meaning it’s a wonderful option for making friends and bonding over your love of animals. 

Help each other care for and nurture pumas at Argentina’s Puma Reserve, Rescue and Rehabilitate all sorts of animals in South Africa’s local project, or protect sea turtles in Sri Lanka. There’s nothing like spending the entire summer looking after baby sea turtles and finally getting to celebrate with friends when they’re ready to be released back into the ocean! 

The great thing about wildlife and conservation projects is that people come from all over the world to volunteer, letting you meet people from all walks of life that you’d normally never run into. Even after returning home, you’ll have the opportunity to foster and develop your new connections, creating lifelong friendships to accompany your memories.   

Sports Coaching

If there’s one thing that’s sure to bring a community together, it’s sports. Volunteering in sports coaching is a great way to meet new people with similar interests, engage in friendly competition, and immerse yourself in a new culture. 

With Volunteering Solutions, available opportunities like Sports Development in South Africa and Argentina’s Sports Coaching Program are perfect for making lifelong connections. 

Who knows - you might even see someone you coach in the future big leagues! 

Mission Trips

Mission trips are exactly what they sound like: you join the program to work with a group of people to achieve a particular goal. These range in topics, from Medical Volunteering in Tanzania to India’s Childcare and Elephant Experience, and let you spend the majority of your time with the same people. 

Depending on the mission trip you choose, you could spend up to 24 weeks with your group - more than enough time to create an unbreakable bond and share experiences. Volunteering with Street Children in India or at an orphanage in Ghana can also leave you and your friends with heartwarming memories to look back on together throughout the years. 

Ready to plan your volunteering adventure? 

Volunteering Solutions is the only organization you need to kickstart your journey and get you ready for life's next big adventure. We’ll be able to advise you on everything you need to know before your trip, along with providing 24/7 support, food and accommodation. We’ll organize as much as we can, so you can stay excited and stress-free about volunteering abroad. 

Ready to get started? Explore our volunteering opportunities for inspiration on where you’d like to travel first.