Zayn Malikjust told millions of listeners that his six-year relationship with Gigi Hadid might not have been love at all.

The 33-year-old singer confessed during his 11 February 2026 appearance on theCall Her Daddy podcast, his first major sit-down interview in nearly six years. Host Alex Cooper asked if he still stood by a 2024 statement he made on The Zach Sang Show, where he admitted he did not know if he had ever truly been in love.

He did not back down. 'Yeah, because my understanding of love is always developing,' Malik said. 'At that moment in time, I might have thought it was love, but as I got older, I realized maybe it wasn't. Maybe it was lust. Maybe it was this, maybe it was that. I don't feel like it was love.'

Malik was 22. Hadid was 20. They started dating in November 2015, broke up and reconciled multiple times, welcomed daughter Khai in September 2020, and split for good in October 2021.

Looking back, Malik now distinguishes between romantic love and the love he still holds for his daughter's mother. 'To be fair, just to say this on the record, I will always love G, because she is the reason my child is on this Earth, and I have the utmost respect for her,' he told Cooper. 'I will always love her, but I don't know if I was ever in love with her.'

Then came the accountability. 'I don't think I was in love with her at that point,' he added. 'Otherwise, I would have been a better version of myself.'

That last sentence landed hard. No blame. No excuses. Just a man in his thirties looking at his twenties and admitting he could have done better.

The interview's most relatable moment had nothing to do with love. It had to do with teeth.

Malik revealed that when five-year-old Khai lost her first tooth, he left nearly $700 (£500) under her pillow from the tooth fairy. Hadid, according to Malik, was not impressed.

'I think I gave her a bit too much money from the tooth fairy,' he admitted. 'And her mum gave me sh-t about it, and I was like, at the end of the day, I work my a-s off, and I should be able to give my kid what I want.'

Source: International Business Times UK