Dating services have had a historically difficult time cracking the Southeast Asian market. While the stigma of online dating has disappeared in the West, it remains alive and well in much of the East. Cultural norms have largely kept the region’s dating rituals in the past.

Things may finally be ready to change. According Forbes, an increase in developer tools has brought more discreet dating options to Southeast Asia, and that may be the key to cracking the market.

Paktor is one of the apps leading the charge into the sector. Since launching in 2013, the company has built a network of around 15 million users and more than 5 billion swipes, making it the largest dating app in the region by both downloads and usage.

She smokes. He doesn’t tip waiters. She’s obsessed with her phone. He gets wasted every weekend. Are these things merely irritating, or are they harbingers of a total relationship meltdown up ahead?

According to research by scientists at Western Sydney University, Indiana University, the University of Florida, Singapore Management University, and Rutgers University, dealbreakers have more power in long-term relationships than in short-term relationships. Women have more dealbreakers than men, but both men and women who consider themselves to be highly desirable have more dealbreakers than the average person.

Overall, daters tend to weigh dealbreakers more heavily than dealmakers - meaning negative attributes overshadow good ones, no matter how good they are.

In other words, you’d better clean up your act. If you want to put your best foot forward in a relationship, it’s essential to recognize your own bad habits and work to improve them.

Features of AirDates

If you’ve been dreaming of joining the Mile High Club, this could be your shot. A new Tinder-esque dating app called AirDates promises to be the greatest in-flight entertainment since SkyMall.

AirDates, as the name suggests, is designed specifically for travelers looking to make love connections while they fly. The app is only in beta, but it’s caused quite a stir since appearing at the Disrupt London conference in Decemeber.

Users upload their travel itineraries prior to boarding to find other travelers on the same route. The app then scans your surroundings for fellow passengers who match your preferences. You can choose to be visible or remain hidden to other users (either way, you’ll be able to chat).

There’s only so much you can learn from carefully curated photos and sparsely filled out profiles. Plenty stretch the truth, resulting in more disappointing first dates than we’d care to try to count. Spin the Bottle, a new video dating app, hopes to solve the problem by skipping straight to actual eye contact.

"With so many 'swipe left, swipe right' dating apps out there right now, we wanted a way to take people beyond the often misleading, perfectly manicured profile pictures and get them right to face time," said Matthew Cohen, CEO and co-founder of Spin Labs, the company behind Spin the Bottle. "Looking into someone's eyes and having a conversation... can be much more revealing than reading a list of interests and seeing a gallery of heavily edited, perfectly filtered selfies."

A new take on the classic party game, Spin the Bottle reimagines the online dating experience with 30 second live video speed dates. The premise is simple: a player gives the bottle their best spin with a swipe, and when it stops, they begin a 30 second video chat date with their match. If they're feeling a spark, they can tap an icon to give their date a kiss and wait for one in return. Two kisses and it's a match.

Christian Mingle is having a sale on subscriptions. The sale starts January 26th and runs to January 29th, 2017. During this time you will be able to receive 30% off a 3 month and 6 month subscription. No coupon is required during this promotion.

Christian Mingle has been matching singles since 1996 and since then has become one of the largest online dating services for Christians. The Christian Mingle website is easy to use and has all the features you need to find your ideal date. A dating app is also available for those of you who wish to access the service from a smart phone. Along with the regular profile questions Christian Mingle also includes faith specific questions about what religion denomination you are and what your current church activity is.

For more information about this popular dating service please read our review of Christian Mingle.

Tinder might have gotten a lot of action in 2016, but according to a recent article in The Washington Post, niche dating apps are poised to get more attention this year.

Research from online dating sites and apps have shown that the biggest increase in memberships and activity occur from New Year’s Day through Valentine’s Day. It’s the time when the most people are looking for love, or at least a few dates. Traditionally, people have gravitated to the bigger sites like Tinder or Match in the hopes of having the widest pool of daters to choose from. But this year, people are looking for new ways to connect.

Part of the problem according to the Post is that dating apps don’t necessarily lead to users getting more dates. It’s easy to swipe endlessly, but that doesn’t seem to translate to meeting in real life. In the past year, poor and flaky dating behavior has left a lot to be desired, and daters are increasingly frustrated.