From throwing insults to talking about a reunion, here’s everything One Direction members have said since their hiatus

After leaving One Direction, Malik went on the record to say he isn’t a fan of the band’s music.

He told Rolling Stone, “That’s not music I would listen to …Would you listen to One Direction at a party with your girl? I wouldn’t. To me, that’s not an insult, that’s me as a 22-year-old man.”

“As much as I was in that band, and I loved everything that we did, that’s not music that I would listen to. I want to make music that I think is cool shit. I don’t think that’s too much to ask for,” he added. 

In 2016, in his first solo, on-camera interview with radio station Beats 1, Malik said he never wanted to be in One Direction. 

“I think I always wanted to go, from like the first year, really,” he told the interviewer. “I never really wanted to be there, like in the band.”

“I realized the direction we were going in — mind the pun — with the music, I instantly realized it wasn’t for me because I realized I couldn’t put any input in,” he added.

In an interview with GQ, Malik said he “didn’t make any friends from the band.” He explained, “It’s not something that I’m afraid to say. I definitely have issues trusting people.

This came as a surprise to fans because, in the Facebook post announcing his departure, Malik wrote that he had “four friends for life.”

Speaking with Vogue UK in 2018, Malik referred to One Direction as a “machine.”

He discussed the band’s sudden rise to fame and rigorous touring schedule saying, “I think back to the performances towards the end when we were in stadiums — I wasn’t really ever able to enjoy the experience. The machine had gone too fast.”

The youngest member of One Direction, Styles, has since released a critically acclaimed music, gone on a world tour, and co-chaired the 2019 Met Gala.

Since the band’s split, he has been relatively quiet about his relationships with the other members of One Direction, but he has mentioned his distant relationship with one member in particular, Malik.

In a 2017 profile for Rolling Stone, Styles responded to Malik saying One Direction’s music wasn’t “cool.”

“I think it’s a shame he felt that way … but I never wish anything but luck to anyone doing what they love. If you’re not enjoying something and need to do something else, you absolutely should do that. I’m glad he’s doing what he likes, and good luck to him,” Styles said. 

Styles told Another Man magazine that a One Direction reunion would never be ruled out. He thinks it is good for the members to be “exploring different things,” but that if a reunion were to happen when everyone felt comfortable, it would be “amazing.”

In March 2020, Styles said that looking back, he doesn’t necessarily think Malik’s leaving the band was a bad thing. 

“I don’t know if I could say it’s something he shouldn’t have done. I just didn’t feel that way. So, it’s hard for me to condemn it, ’cause I don’t,” he said on “The Howard Stern Show.”

“Especially in hindsight looking at it now, the last thing that I would’ve wanted is for him to have stayed there if he didn’t want to be there.”

During his December 2020 Vogue cover interview, Styles spoke about what it was like being in One Direction.

“I think the typical thing is to come out of a band like that and almost feel like you have to apologize for being in it,” Styles told Vogue. “But I loved my time in it. It was all new to me, and I was trying to learn as much as I could.”

He added, “I wanted to soak it in … I think that’s probably why I like traveling now — soaking stuff up.”

For the April 2022 Better Homes & Gardens cover story, Styles spoke more about his time in the band and the impact it left on him. 

He said being in the band was “all about how do you keep it going and how do you get it to grow.”

“There were so many years where, for me, especially in the band and the first few years coming out of it, I’d just been terrified of it ending, because I didn’t necessarily know who I was if I didn’t do music,” he added.

He also said during some of the COVID-19 lockdowns, he began “processing a lot of stuff that happened when I was in the band,” especially how he was encouraged to give a lot of pieces of himself away to get people to like him.

While on “The Late Late Show With James Corden,” Styles was asked if a 1D reunion would ever happen.

“I think I would never say never to that. If there was a time when we wanted to do it, I don’t see why we wouldn’t,” he said. 

When beginning his solo career, Tomlinson expressed uncertainty about his ability to collaborate with superstars.

In 2017, he told The Guardian, “I couldn’t say to you now that I could definitely get a superstar writer in a session with me,” later adding, “Harry [Styles] won’t struggle with any of that.”

Tomlinson has already released music with Bebe Rexha and Steve Aoki, and his bandmates have also created hit songs with famed artists.

Styles has collaborated with Stevie Nicks, Ariana Grande, and Kacey Musgraves; Malik has collaborated with artists like Taylor Swift and Sia; Horan has worked with Julia Michaels and Maren Morris; and Payne has worked with stars like Rita Ora and Zedd. 

In a 2019 interview with ODE Entertainment, Tomlinson said he feels a One Direction reunion is “inevitable,” but he doesn’t know when exactly it will happen. 

In a later interview with “Build” that same year, the singer said he wasn’t really ready for the band to go on a break.

“It surprised me to a certain degree, so I didn’t have any plan in place or anything like that,” he added. “I think I just thought that I was going to carry on writing for other people, but not necessarily for myself.”

He said he ended up writing a lot of songs and liking some, so he decided to pursue a solo singing career. 

In October 2019, the singer told Metro that he didn’t think he was ready to decide if he could forgive Malik. 

“I just don’t think I am mature enough, even in my own head, to give that a real answer. At the moment, I am still pretty mad about the whole thing,” he told the publication.

“I don’t think [Zayn] handled it very well. But never say never. Who knows? He chatted a lot of shit in the early days. I thought One Direction were pretty good,” he added. 

During a January 2020 interview with Rolling Stone, Tomlinson was asked why he never really complains about or renounces One Direction.

He explained that he absolutely loves the band and still misses his time with his former bandmates. 

“First, I absolutely fucking love the band. I’m super proud about where I’ve come from. At the end of the day, I’m from Doncaster, and the band gave me such a nice opportunity,” he told the publication.”

He also said he thinks it’s a “desperate attempt to try and get cool points” when people leave their bands and trash-talk it afterward. 

“I fucking love the boys, and I love everything we’ve done together. And I still miss my time with them. I think any of the boys would be lying if they said otherwise. It was a special time in our lives, definitely,” he added. 

In July 2022, Tomlinson was on “Smallzy’s Surgery” show. 

“Twelve years today the band got formed,” he said. When the host said he only met Tomlinson 11 years ago and was “late to the party” Tomlinson said. “the first album was shit anyway,” referring to One Direction’s debut “Up All Night.” 

Later in the interview, he spoke about his solo career after the band split up. 

“There’s still pressure, obviously, for me to deliver a good record but there was just so many different opinions on the first album and me trying to find my feet coming out of a band the size of One Direction, there was so much going on,” he said. 

Tomlinson told  The Telegraph that he’d “be lying if I said it didn’t bother me at first” seeing Styles’ solo career take off after the band went on hiatus.

He said he felt bothered by Styles’ success “only ’cause I didn’t know where to place myself, and really my only point of reference was other members of the band.”

But, he said, he’s not surprised Styles is “the most commercially successful because he really fits the mold of a modern star.”

“I look on Harry like a brother, man,” Tomlinson said. “I have a lot of pride for what he’s doing.”

In a video for Music Choice, Payne was asked about some of his bandmates’ solo music.

He said Styles’ single “Sign of the Times”‘ is not his “sort of music” and isn’t something he’d listen to but he respects Harry’s taste and thinks he “did a great job of doing what he wanted to do.”

“He’d say the same thing about me,” Payne said of Styles. Payne creates hip-hop-style music whereas Style’s solo tracks have classic-rock vibes. 

Payne said Horan’s solo single “This Town” was “great.” 

Payne, who has had success with solo songs like “Strip That Down,” and “Get Low,” responded to a fan on X when they asked him about a reunion in 2019.

The fan reportedly shared two screenshots of conflicting reports of a reunion tour, asking Payne if he could make up his mind.

Payne responded by writing, “Can people stop passing blame to me about this I get asked this ridiculous question 500x a day (exaggeration)… so I just say whatever guess I have at the time… but still this band has 3 other members you want the answer ask them.”

During a November 2019 interview with the “Hits Radio Breakfast Show,” Payne said he’d be interested in collaborating with Styles — even though he once said he wasn’t a huge fan of his music. 

“From the first song off his album, I feel like me and Harry could do a really cool song together,” he said on the show, speaking of Styles’ album “Fine Line” and the first single from it, “Lights Up.”

“There could be a good mix between the two things because the first song was kind of funky so I feel like we could break down into some sort of hip-hop-R&B thing halfway though, and have like a little megamix,” Payne explained.

In December 2019, Payne told the “Sunday Brunch” radio show that he thinks the band will get back together “at some point.”

“‘I think we will for sure. I don’t know when that is yet, but all I know is that there are at least two years because everyone’s released new music and you have to go and promo. There are at least two years,” he added. 

In a November 2019 interview with GQ, Payne said “everything changed” once One Direction parted ways.

“New teams, new managers, new labels. Building those working relationships can be tricky. You also become the boss of your own shit, and I was 21, 22 when I first started doing my own thing, so it’s all a bit scary and can be a bit lonely,” he told the publication, saying the process is a lot of fun, too. 

“Now the band members have all worked our way through this first couple of years, you can kind of see everyone’s finding their own feet. Take Harry [Styles] at the moment. You know, he’s just found what I think is his sound and exactly where he wants to be, which took him a little minute to get into since he had his last album out,” he added.

The singer also mentioned that a few years after the band went on a break, he went into therapy to cope.

“That first therapy session and being like, ‘I don’t even know what I like or anything about myself’ — it was pretty scary stuff,” he told GQ. 

While playing the game “Plead the Fifth” on “Watch What Happens Live With Andy Cohen,” Payne said he reunited with Styles after a few years of not speaking to him.

“We spoke about a number of things, we hadn’t seen each other for three years. Literally I hadn’t seen him once, we hadn’t spoken or anything. He was pretty much the same boy that I left him. We spoke about kids and happiness and all sorts of stuff,” he told Cohen.

Later on in the game, Payne chose to stay mum about reports that he dated supermodel Naomi Campbell, which then forced him to answer a question about which member of 1D is the “most well-endowed.”

“I’d have to say myself, I’m going to say me. That’s almost like pleading the Fifth,” he said.

“For Zayn, he loves music and he’s an amazing talent. He genuinely was the best singer in One Direction, hand on heart, out of all of us,” Payne also told GQ.

He said he tried to reach out to Malik but got to a point where he “wouldn’t know where to begin.”

“I hope he has good people around him, but I don’t at this stage think it’s anything the rest of us can solve,” Payne added. 

In an interview with the Capital Breakfast radio show, Payne shared some of his first thoughts when One Direction was first formed on “The X Factor” in 201o.

“I don’t know why it was so confusing to me that Niall was from Ireland because I just was thinking, ‘How is this gonna work he’s from a whole other country, he’s not even nearby … ,’ Payne recalled. 

The “Strip That Down” singer also said the boys had trouble deciding who would sing which parts and no one wanted to make “cut-throat decisions.” Because of this, the group ended up singing together for a lot of the performances. 

“So we all used to do it in unison, which was the most horrible thing I’ve ever heard in my life,” he added. 

On October 20, 2020, while streaming a live video on his YouTube channel, Payne listened to Styles’ song “Golden,” from the “Fine Line” album.

“My eyes are kind of gold, do you reckon this one’s about me?” he joked. “… It could be about me, we just don’t know it yet.”

The singer bopped his head to the song and even sang along to some parts.

“I like this. Yeah, it’s cool,” he said. ” … 10 out of 10, I like it a lot.”

In March 2021, Styles scored his first Grammy win for best pop solo performance for “Watermelon Sugar.” 

Shortly after the show, Payne shared a One Direction meme on his Instagram story, which featured a picture of young One Direction in leather next to Styles in leather during his Grammy performance. 

 “Congrats @hshq on your Grammy win. What a huge moment, proud to be your brother,” he wrote. 

On a May episode of the “Impaulsive” podcast, Payne spoke about his time in the band and his feelings about his bandmates. 

He said the band never really had time to celebrate their accomplishments and they were often locked in their hotel rooms. Payne spoke about how he was leading the band from behind the stage, too, and how he hesitated before joining the band in the first place.

The singer also spoke about his former One Direction bandmates and recalled a time when one of them (unnamed) threw him against a wall. 

In the interview, he also said that “wild” Tomlinson is his “best mate now” but they “hated each other” at first.

He said there are “many, many reasons why I dislike Zayn and there’s many reasons why I’ll always always be on his side.”

He apologized for his comments after receiving backlash from fans. 

After a months-long break, the singer returned to his YouTube channel with an eight-minute video to speak about the comments he’d made about One Direction and his former bandmates on the “Impaulsive” podcast in 2022. 

He said a lot of what he said “came from the wrong place” and a place of “self-protection.” 

“My own frustrations with my own career and where I kind of landed, I took shots at everybody else which is wrong. Obviously, I want to apologize for that, in the first instance, because that’s definitely not me,” he said in the video. 

He continued, “The rest of the boys really stuck by me when I needed them most — they kinda came to the rescue. Even Zayn, as well, which is why I did send him a little thank you online. It came across really big-headed didn’t it?”

After the podcast, he said, he “went away” for a while, stopped drinking, and has been sober for almost six months.  

In an interview with Billboard, Horan said he sometimes feels like something is missing when touring solo as opposed to in a band.

He said, “You’re sitting in an airport lounge, they call you for a plane, and you don’t stand up initially because you’re waiting on ­everyone else, you know? ‘Oh, Louis’ll be back from the toilet in a minute.'”

“As long as I’ve known him, Zayn’s been the hardest man to stay in touch with. Then we had a falling out a few years ago and, to be honest, that’s just the dynamic: You have people you are friends with and people you are not,” Horan told British GQ, adding that he stays in touch with the rest of his bandmates, though.

“We don’t get to see each other as much as we’d like to, but we try. I talk to Louis a lot. It’s the lads with the kids that you try to keep in touch with, especially just to see how they are,” he added.

On One Direction’s 10-year anniversary, Horan shared an Instagram of the band (before Malik left) on tour and wrote, “when I met these four gents there was no way I thought we would go on to do what we did. So many unbelievable memories we shared together. We felt the adoration of millions from around the planet on a daily basis and it was mind blowing.”

He continued, “It’s such a major part of our lives and always will be. Cheers to US today boys and thank you to all you beautiful people who have supported us over the last 10 years.”

He also tagged his bandmates and added a heart emoji to the caption. 

In an interview with Dermot O’Leary on the “People, Just People” Audible podcast, the singer answered questions about how the band was feeling just before they went on hiatus. They’d just wrapped the On the Road Again stadium tour. 

“It sounds mad even saying it. We’d done two years of stadiums and it was kind of like there. So where do you go now without messing it up? There’s no conversation of, ‘Let’s leave it 20 years,'” he said.

He continued, “It was just very much like, let’s not book anything we’re all knackered. We’d been working flat-out since we were 16, 17 years old.”

The Irish singer said he had mixed feelings about the band going on hiatus, noting he would’ve loved “a couple years off” but shortly after the hiatus he ended up recording solo music because he missed the studio and the “buzz” of doing interviews and photo shoots.

He added, “It’s all I’ve ever wanted to do, whether with the lads or not.”

This story was originally published on May 30, 2019, and most recently updated on October 17, 2024.