It depends a lot on who you are and how you travel.

I was much lonelier living in Denver full-time than I have been traveling full-time. Because loneliness isn’t about how many people are around you. It’s about connection. And it’s possible to feel disconnected and lonely anywhere.

Of course, my experience isn’t the only experience. Many nomads are lonely. Others aren’t. It seems to depend on the person, how much they enjoy their own company, how much they enjoy making new friends and creating new communities, and, importantly, how they travel.

Being a digital nomad doesn’t have to mean moving every few days, every week, or even every month. I know nomads who have two or three communities that feel like home to them, and they bounce back and forth between them, with lots of new travel in between. One nomadic couple goes to South Africa, Switzerland, and Utah yearly. In between, they have plenty of other adventures, but those communities feel like home to them, and they keep going back and building them up. I do this a bit with Paris - going back every year or two and spending more and more time with my fabulous girlfriends there—a group that grows and shifts over the years.

Others don’t have places to return to but travel slowly enough to make friends and feel connected to their communities. Staying for three months six, six, or even a year or two in a new place can still feel very nomadic, but it also allows you to know a place and its people.

Finally, some digital nomads (myself included) include good friends on our itineraries every year, which helps us stay connected to the people who matter most to us. This year, I spent four months living in my best friend’s town (a place she moved to fairly recently and I’d never been before). Last year, I invited a good friend to live with me in Amsterdam for a week. Etc. Etc.

The bottom line is that being a digital nomad is a lifestyle about total freedom. If you feel lonely, you can go live in your best friend’s town, invite someone to travel with you, or stay in a place longer and focus on building up your community.