Who Is Nessa Barrett? Meet the TikTok Star and Singer

The Love Island USA season 6 cast gained star status while they were in the villa and returned to the real world with new fans in July 2024. Rob Rausch, who was a Casa Amor bombshell during the season prior, was a hot commodity amongst single young women when he was eliminated off the show.

Days after returning to the States, Rob was spotted with TikToker Nessa Barrett, leading fans to speculate that the two are romantically connected.

Rob Rausch and Nessa Barrett’s Night Out

Eagle-eyed fans noticed that the reality star and “dying on the inside” artist followed each other on Instagram right after he received his phone back from production.

On July 23, 2024, Rob and Nessa were photographed during a night out on the town in Los Angeles. They took a night drive as the snake wrangler was behind the wheel of a convertible with its top down, while Nessa sat in the passenger seat.

Fans reshared the photo on social media and were not the biggest supporters of the potential pair.

“NESSA RUN! RUN GIRL! RUN!” one person wrote under a TikTok video that shared the photo of the singer and Rob.

Meanwhile, others connected the dots and speculated that they were filming a scene for Nessa’s upcoming music video “Passenger Princess.”

Where Is Nessa Barrett From?

The Gen Z star was born and raised in New Jersey before moving to California to boost her career.

Nessa Barrett Became an Overnight Internet Sensation

Nessa launched her TikTok account in March 2019 and quickly gained followers. Once the social media app gained popularity during the lockdown amid the coronavirus pandemic, Nessa was already one of the popular girls, raking in more than 1,000,000 followers. However, her rise to fame wasn’t like it’s made out to be.

Who Is Nessa Barrett? Meet the TikTok Star and Singer — Getty

“The very beginning of me being online, I was doing whatever I could to be the person that everyone wanted me to be and to be liked and I faked almost everything. I wasn’t being real, I wasn’t myself,” she told Alex Cooper during a 2022 appearance on “Call Her Daddy”. “For one, like my style and my attitude. I have struggled with mental health so much and I am a pretty sad person but, in the beginning, I developed such a bubbly character that was almost like, ‘Oh, I don’t care. I’m just happy and giggly.’ It was just not me and then over time, I just kind of allowed myself to be that person that everyone could make fun of.”

Nessa Is an Advocate for Mental Health

The scrutiny she faced made her face her mental health struggles as she lives with Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD), anxiety and depression. Nessa has been open about her daily challenges and credited music to helping her live her life authentically.

“I feel like the second I actually started, you know, making music and writing my music it really helped me understand who I was. And that’s when I just stopped caring,” the “young forever” singer said. “I’m just going do what I want to do and I’m going to be myself because I mean it’s like the best thing to do at this point.”

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Who Has Nessa Dated?

Nessa and ex-boyfriend Josh Richards were the teen internet couple in quarantine when they dated between January and June 2020. They were on-again, off-again until they ended things for the final time in March 2021.

“There comes a point in relationships where you realize maybe it isn’t best to be together,” Josh said in their June 2020 breakup video via YouTube. “We realized that we needed to mature and we needed to grow as people. We were in a very serious relationship but we weren’t ready for as serious as it was.”