Did Camila Cabello Shade Sabrina Carpenter at the iHeartRadio Music Festival? Why Fans Think So

Is Camila Cabello giving Sabrina Carpenter a taste of some shade?

When Cabello hit the stage at the 2024 iHeartRadio Music Festival on Sept. 20, she made a subtle tweak to the lyrics of her hit Shawn Mendes duet “Señorita” — and some fans think the change was a dig at Carpenter and her new song “Taste.”

"You say we’re just friends/But friends don’t know the way you…" Cabello sang last Friday in Las Vegas.

Though the next word in the line is “taste,” the star, 27, pointedly did not sing “taste,” instead going silent and putting a finger to her lips with a knowing look before continuing the song.

Carpenter, 25, released “Taste” on her new album Short n’ Sweet last month, and the track is thought to be about her reported romance with Mendes —who also dated Cabello for several years before breaking up, then briefly getting back together.

Mendes, 26, and Cabello first broke up in 2021 after more than two years of dating, but briefly rekindled their romance in 2023, shortly after rumors swirled that Carpenter and Mendes were an item (Mendes later denied the alleged romance with Carpenter in an interview in March 2023).

"I heard you're back together and if that's true / You'll just have to taste me when he's kissin' you / If you want forever, I bet you do / Just know you'll taste me too," Carpenter sings on “Taste.”

Though Cabello didn’t explicitly call out Carpenter onstage, many fans quickly jumped on the apparent reference (Cabello's performance was livestreamed, and because the song lyric is a reference to sex, the star could have opted not to sing "taste" as a way of censoring herself).

“This was [what] pop used to be about we’re so back,” one fan wrote, while another added, “She did NOT.”

“I love both, but I love this drama more,” a third fan wrote.

Carpenter has not revealed the subjects of her songs, but Short n’ Sweet seems to contain several references to Mendes. On “Coincidence,” she seems to shout out Mendes and Cabello’s reunion at Coachella in 2023, singing, “What a surprise, your phone just died/Your car drove itself from L.A. to her thighs/Palm Springs looks nice, but who’s by your side?/Damn it, she looks kinda like the girl you outgrew.”

Mendes and Cabello broke up in November 2021, but were seen kissing at Coachella in April 2023. They ultimately ended things once more that June.

“You’re just kind of like, it’s not a fit, it doesn’t feel right,” she said on the Call Her Daddy podcast in March of their second split. “And I think, luckily, I was in a place in my life where it took me less time to realize that. It took us both less time to be like, ‘This doesn’t feel right and we don’t need to try so hard to make it work. It’s all good.’”

She continued, “I will always care about him and love him. He’s such a good person and I’m lucky because some people have exes that are awful, and he is not. He’s a really kind, good person.”