Lauv Biography: I Like Me Better, Songs and Khalid

Lauv is the stage name of American singer, songwriter and producer Ari Staprans Leff. He is best known for I Like Me Better, the 2017 pop song about how a new relationship changed the way he saw himself. Its exact title matters: searches for I Like It Better Lauv or Lauv I Like Me usually refer to I Like Me Better. His other well-known songs include The Other, Paris in the Rain, i’m so tired… with Troye Sivan and Steal the Show from Pixar’s Elemental.

His work has moved beyond the love songs that first drew attention to him. Lauv has released two studio albums, written for other artists and spoken openly about mental health and identity. In 2026, he released the EP Songs I Couldn’t Forget and recorded Tied Up with Khalid. He later left Khalid’s tour and said he needed time to care for his mental health. That announcement is an important part of his recent story, but it does not erase the music he released that year.

What is “I Like Me Better” about?

I Like Me Better is about feeling more comfortable with yourself in someone else’s company. Lauv wrote it after he had moved from New York to Los Angeles, but the memory behind it came from his first year in New York. He had fallen in love soon after arriving for college. At a time when he did not feel sure of who he was, that relationship made him like the person he became beside his partner.

Lauv explained that origin in a 2017 interview about I Like Me Better. The song’s idea is personal, yet it needs little background to make sense. Its title turns a familiar love-song thought around: the focus is partly on the other person and partly on the singer’s view of himself. That distinction helps explain why the song became his breakthrough. It has a bright melody and a compact chorus, but it also carries the uncertainty that runs through much of Lauv’s work. The words recall a specific period in his life. The feeling can fit a new romance, an old memory or any close relationship that helps someone feel at ease.

When did “I Like Me Better” come out?

Lauv released I Like Me Better in May 2017. It reached No. 27 on the Billboard Hot 100 and later appeared on I Met You When I Was 18 (The Playlist), the collection he completed in 2018. The song brought a much larger audience to an artist who had already released The Other and written music for other performers.

The wording in the title also clears up several common searches. I Like It Better is not the title of Lauv’s hit, and “I Like Me” is only part of it. Readers who want the complete I Like Me Better lyrics can use Lauv’s official music video or a licensed music service. The song’s central thought is clear without reproducing the full lyrics here: he likes himself better when he is with the person he loves.

Lauv’s early life and the name behind his music

Ari Staprans Leff was born in San Francisco on August 8, 1994. He moved with his family during childhood and learned piano and viola before he took up guitar. Music became more than a school activity. As a teenager, he wrote songs, played in bands and began to work out how the sounds he liked could become his own recordings.

He later studied music technology at New York University. That choice suited both sides of his interests. He wanted to write songs, but he also cared about their sound and production. During his college years, he spent time on music for other artists. He has described a point when that work drew him away from the direct, personal style he had used as a younger songwriter.

The name Lauv marked a return to that style. He has explained that it comes from the Latvian word for “lion” and connects to his mother’s Latvian heritage. His first name, Ari, also means “lion” in Hebrew. The stage name gave his solo music an identity, but the songs still drew on his own experiences.

“The Other” and his first releases

The Other was the first song Lauv released under his new stage name. He wrote it with Michael Matosic after a breakup. At the time, Lauv also worked on material that other artists might record. He felt this song belonged to him and chose to sing it himself. Its spare electronic sound gave room to the vocal and the uneasy feelings in the lyrics. The track drew attention online in 2015 and appeared on his debut EP, Lost in the Light. That response gave Lauv an early audience before I Like Me Better reached pop radio. His own account of the period describes a shift back toward songs that felt close to his life.

He continued to release songs and to write for others. That work included No Promises, recorded by Cheat Codes with Demi Lovato, and Boys, recorded by Charli XCX. His role in those tracks was as a writer and, in the case of No Promises, a producer. They should not be confused with songs he released as Lauv.

Height and Weight

Body Measurement and Appearance

Family and Relationships

His father is Stuart Leff. His mother is a talented homemaker. Her name is Silvija Staprāns. He has three siblings. His girlfriend’s name is Sophie Cates.

Parents: Father Mother	Stuart Leff Silvija Staprāns
Siblings: Brother Sister	No data Two older sisters
Marital Status	Unmarried
Wife	None
Children: Son Daughter	None None
Girlfriend	Sophie Cates

How “I Like Me Better” changed his career

The contrast between “The Other” and “I Like Me Better” showed two sides of Lauv’s early music. “The Other” had a restrained, sad sound. “I Like Me Better” kept the close, first-person lyric but set it against a lighter pop track. Lauv had made a song listeners could put on at a party without losing the private feeling that mattered to him.

Its success led more listeners to his earlier releases. In 2018, he completed I Met You When I Was 18 (The Playlist), a set of songs tied to his move to New York, his first serious experience of love and the changes that followed. The title describes the collection’s story. It was a playlist of his work, not his debut studio album. That distinction matters because ~how i’m feeling~ arrived later, in 2020.

Lauv also took the songs on tour. A track first shaped by his own memories now had audiences who attached their memories to it. That is a common change for a songwriter after a hit, but Lauv’s later interviews show that he still placed weight on the story behind each song. He has spoken about the freedom to write from a feeling without trying to fit a fixed sound.

The songs beyond his biggest hit

A listener who knows only “I Like Me Better” may miss how often Lauv changes the mood within the same broad pop style. “Paris in the Rain” offers another close view of romance. “The Other” sits with the end of a relationship. “There’s No Way,” his duet with Julia Michaels, gives two singers a shared story of attraction and hesitation.

In 2019, Lauv and Troye Sivan released “i’m so tired…,” a duet about exhaustion with love songs after a breakup. The two voices work together because each singer sounds caught in the same frustrating loop. Lauv later explained that he and Sivan met at a rehearsal space and that the collaboration grew from time they spent in the studio. The song became a UK top-ten hit.

Other tracks took him further from a simple romance theme. “Drugs & the Internet” addressed emptiness and the pressure of life online. “Sad Forever” spoke directly about mental health. “Modern Loneliness” looked at the distance that can exist even when communication feels constant. The titles are direct, but each song comes from a different point in his work and personal life.

~how i’m feeling~: His debut studio album

Lauv released ~how i’m feeling~ on March 6, 2020. The album contains 21 tracks, a larger project than the earlier playlist. It brings together several sides of his music: love songs, restless pop tracks and more direct accounts of isolation and mental health. The album reached No. 16 on the US Billboard 200.

Its guests have distinct roles. Troye Sivan joins Lauv on i’m so tired…, and Anne-Marie appears on fuck, i’m lonely. LANY joins him on Mean It. Who features Jimin and Jungkook of BTS? Those credits matter because Lauv has also worked with BTS on other music; a mention of the group alone does not tell readers which members appear on this album track.

The album made Lauv’s subject matter wider without cutting off the earlier songs. A listener can hear the writer behind I Like Me Better in its direct lines about attachment. The difference is that he gives equal space to doubt, stress and the parts of himself that do not fit one neat version of a romantic pop singer.

All 4 Nothing and a broader sound

Lauv’s second studio album, All 4 Nothing, arrived in August 2022. “26” preceded the album, followed by “All 4 Nothing (I’m So in Love).” The latter sounds open and joyful, yet the record as a whole does not stay in one mood. Its songs move between affection, uncertainty and the pressure Lauv put on himself.

A second album gave him room to test what his music could sound like after the long run of singles attached to his debut. The change was not a clean break. He still wrote in the first person and put his voice at the centre of the tracks. He also had years of concerts and studio work behind him, which gave the new songs a different setting from the college memories that shaped his first hit. All 4 Nothing reached No. 9 on Billboard’s Top Independent Albums chart. That is a specific chart result, not a claim that every song on the album topped a chart. Lauv’s career is easier to follow through the releases themselves than through broad labels about success.

Film music, collaborations and songs for other artists

In 2023, Lauv released “Steal the Show” for Pixar’s Elemental. It gave him a different task from writing a song solely for one of his own projects. The music had to sit beside an animated story and its characters, yet still sound like a Lauv track. Its place in the film also introduced his voice to viewers who might not have followed his albums.

He continued with singles such as “Love U Like That,” then released “Potential” and “First Heartbreak” in 2024. “Potential” was especially personal. In an interview about the track, Lauv said it was the first song in which he had openly written about his feelings for a man. That description comes from Lauv himself; it does not require a reader to assign him a fixed label.

His career also includes work that listeners may have heard without recognising his name. Alongside his credits on “No Promises” and “Boys,” Lauv wrote “Imperfections,” which Céline Dion recorded for her album Courage. He has described a difference between a song he wants to perform himself and one that suits another artist. That choice has shaped his career as much as his own singles have.

Lauv and Khalid: “Tied Up” and the 2026 tour

Searches for “Lauv and Khaled” usually mean Lauv and Khalid, the American singer whose name is spelled with an i. The two artists released “Tied Up” on May 8, 2026. Music services credit the single to Khalid and Lauv together. It is a separate release from “I Like Me Better” and from Lauv’s February EP. Lauv joined Khalid’s It’s Always Summer Somewhere Tour, but he announced on June 2 that he would leave it. In his statement, he said he was struggling and needed to step away for a time to care for his mental health. He apologised to fans and to Khalid. Khalid responded with a message of support. The announcement concerned Lauv’s place on that tour; it should not be turned into a claim about his private treatment or a permanent end to his music career.

The date of a release also matters here. Lauv’s single “Don’t You Know” appeared on music services on June 12, 2026, after his tour announcement. A released track can be part of an artist’s catalogue even when that artist has stepped back from concerts. The release alone does not tell us when he recorded it or what he planned to do next.

Songs I Couldn’t Forget and his recent work

Lauv released songs i couldn’t forget on February 27, 2026. It is a six-song EP, not a third studio album. Apple Music describes its songs as intimate, pared-back work written early in Ari Leff’s career. The project gives listeners a chance to hear material connected to an earlier stage of his life through a release that arrived years after his breakthrough.

That timing makes the EP distinct from a standard follow-up to All 4 Nothing. Lauv did not need to invent a new account of his past for these songs. Their value lies partly in the distance between when he wrote them and when listeners received them. Someone who first found him through “I Like Me Better” can hear another part of the writer whose work led to that single. The EP, “Tied Up” and “Don’t You Know” are all part of his 2026 release history. His departure from Khalid’s tour is part of that same year, but it answers a different question: why he stopped those live appearances. Taken together, the releases and his statement give a clear account of what was announced and issued by September 29, 2026, without guessing at his next album or tour.

Mental health, identity and his own words

Lauv has spoken about anxiety, depression, and the role music has played in his life. He created the Blue Boy Foundation to support efforts that help young people seek mental health care. His “My Blue Thoughts” project gave fans a place to share thoughts they found hard to say elsewhere. He also directed proceeds from “Sad Forever” to mental health organisations. These are concrete parts of his work outside a normal album release, not a reason to treat every song as a report on his current health.

He has also spoken in public about questions around his sexuality. In 2023, Lauv told fans that he was exploring those feelings and did not have a final answer or label to give them. His 2024 account of writing “Potential” about feelings for a man adds context to the song. The clearest way to report this part of his life is to keep his own descriptions intact rather than turn a stage of self-exploration into a settled claim he did not make.

Lauv’s June 2026 tour statement deserves the same care. He chose to explain his absence and to speak about mental health in his own words. It does not give an outside reader access to the full details of his health. What can be said is that he left the tour, told fans why he needed to step away, and had released new music earlier that year.

Current Net Worth	$6 million
Income Source	Singing, songwriting, and musician
Debut: Album	EP: Lost in the Light (2015)

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Common questions about Lauv

Is “I Like It Better” a Lauv song?

The song is called “I Like Me Better.” Lauv released it in 2017. Searches for “I Like It Better Lauv,” “Lauv I Like Me” and similar phrases usually lead to the same track.

What do the “I Like Me Better” lyrics mean?

They describe how being with someone Lauv loved made him feel better about himself. He connected the song to a relationship that began soon after he moved to New York for college, though he wrote the track after his move to Los Angeles.

Did Lauv make a song with Khalid?

Khalid and Lauv released “Tied Up” on May 8, 2026. Lauv also joined Khalid’s 2026 tour before he announced that he needed to leave it to care for his mental health.

Are Lauv and “Robbery” connected?

Lauv’s established releases discussed here do not include a song called “Robbery.” A search for “Lauve robbery” may mix Lauv’s name with a different artist or song. Check the credited artist and exact track title before treating a result as his work.

What is Lauv’s real name?

Lauv’s full name is Ari Staprans Leff. He chose his stage name in part for its connection to the Latvian word for “lion” and his family heritage.

Is I Met You When I Was 18 Lauv’s first album?

It is an earlier collection presented as a playlist. Lauv’s debut studio album is ~how i’m feeling~, released in 2020. His second studio album, All 4 Nothing, followed in 2022.