Hinge Offers New Feature Date From Home

Dating app Hinge has just released a new feature called Date From Home, which allows users to let their matches know they are ready for a virtual date.

Hinge’s feature is different from the new in-app video chat option Plenty of Fish is offering, though they are both owned by the same parent company Match Group. Namely, Hinge users can’t video chat over the app (at least at this point), and there isn’t a “community” of livestreams to sort through, or virtual gifts to give and earn as there are on POF.

Instead, as Thrillist described, it’s pretty discreet. There’s a menu at the bottom of the message feed with your match. You can choose whether or not you’re ready to go on a virtual date, but there’s no push notification sent to your match right away if you say yes. Instead, Hinge waits until your match says they want to go on a virtual date with you, too, at which point it activates. In other words, he will never know you wanted to virtual date him unless he says he wants to date you too. Then you are both notified and can schedule your own Zoom or Facetime session.

How to use Date From Home

POF’s new video chat feature was in partnership with The Meet Group, a technology company that provides video features and has its own suite of dating apps. However, Hinge did not partner with The Meet Group to include video technology in its own app, instead sticking to its brand mantra to get people off its app and dating (even if it’s virtually).

Hinge is also planning to update its “We Met” feature according to The Verge, asking users if they had a video date and whether their match was the type of person they’d like to chat with again.

As we are all experiencing the effects of a global pandemic and isolating at home, virtual connection has become a lifeline. Many singles are finding themselves back on dating apps – but this time, they are lingering and messaging each other for longer periods of time. In fact, when Hinge surveyed its users about virtual dating, 70 percent said they’d be open to going on a date over an app like Zoom or Facetime.

And a recent study by Dating.com found that dating app usage around the world was up 82 percent, and that people are spending more time chatting with matches than they did before the pandemic.

Daters also care less than they did before about physical location. Tinder is offering its Passport feature free to all users, so they can virtually connect with dates all over the world instead of being locked into their current location. Since the beginning of March, the app reports that daily conversations have increased 20% across the globe.

For more on this service you can read our Hinge dating app review.