Do Singles Want High-Priced Dating Apps?
Contributed by: kellyseal on Friday, December 15 2023 @ 12:40 pm
Last modified on Friday, December 15 2023 @ 01:08 pm
Tinder and Hinge have recently released new ultra-premium subscriptions for what they called “motivated daters,” but a significant population of singles would rather not pay the steep price for a dating app experience. In fact, the more companies try to monetize dating app features, the more it seems to turn off daters altogether.
A recent report from Bloomberg found that people are gravitating back to in-person events like speed dating, which saw a 63 percent increase in participation this past year according to Eventbrite. And they are reluctant to pay the $500 subscription for Tinder or $60 subscription for Hinge, though Match Group has noticed an uptick in revenue since releasing the premium services.
According to Bloomberg[*1] , third-quarter downloads for Hinge were the app’s best ever and that 1.3 million of its users pay for a subscription. Bumble will be offering short term subscriptions as well as its own high-priced premium service in the coming months.
Still, many users are increasingly unsatisfied with the experience of dating apps, and the companies’ priorities for increasing revenue by monetizing desirable features. As one Hinge user said in their TikTok post that went viral: “Hinge does not care about finding your soulmate or someone to go out with. They just care about taking your money and keeping the attractive people locked away on the app for as long as possible.”
The economy isn’t helping people on dating apps either, with young people particularly affected. The PYMTS Intelligence study which was done in conjunction with Mastercard surveyed 2,100 U.S. consumers, and found that of all the generations participating, Gen Z is most likely to prioritize necessities when it comes to expenses, and don’t consider dating apps to be crucial to their lives.
Fifty percent said they would cancel their dating app subscriptions if they were unable to pay their other bills, while only 19 percent said they would keep paying for dating app subscriptions even when other bills would go unpaid.
When popular apps like Tinder and Hinge start monetizing more features, more singles, especially young daters, are reluctant to use them all together.
According to website PYMNTS[*2] , Sticky.io CEO Brian Bogosian said in a panel for the J.P. Morgan Payments Series “Global Innovators in Payments” about dating apps: “The bar continues to get higher. People’s budgets are getting squeezed. People aren’t spending money frivolously.” He went on to say: “If they don’t get value, if they don’t get flexibility, if they don’t get incentives to continue, they’ll drop off.”
Dating apps have enjoyed some banner years during and since the pandemic – but now revenue is declining, and with the economic crunch, they have to look for new ways to monetize. For the time being, it looks like paid features are here to stay.
For more on the dating services with higher priced memberships, check out our Tinder and Hinge dating app reviews.