India

Dating app Bumble found that more singles in India are practicing “dry dating” or dating while sober. In fact, the dating app expects this to be the number one dating trend in the country in 2023, thanks to young daters.

A recent poll taken by the app found that 24 percent of single Indians who drink say they don’t plan to do so on dates this year, even past dry January. When asked why, the majority (56 percent) said they wanted to get to know the other person “without being distracted,” according to The Economic Times.

Forty-five percent said they were choosing not to drink on dates to improve their health and wellness by consuming less alcohol.

Match Group has named new key executives, including its first CTO and a new President and CFO, as well as a new focus on four key businesses – Tinder, Hinge, Asia and Evergreen & Emerging.

According to the company’s press release, Gary Swindler was named to the top position of Match Group as President and CFO, and Will Wu joins as chief technology officer, a newly created position, to oversee product innovation across all apps. Swindler was promoted from his position as CFO and COO and Wu joins from Snap Inc., where he oversaw the commercialization of Snap’s developer platforms and spearheaded the creation of its most famous features like “Discover” and the “Chat” messaging feature, as well as Snap’s social gaming feature. 

Match Group is betting big on Wu, who brings an impressive background with developing one of the earliest revenue streams for Snap, as well as developing Snap’s primary social engagement driver.

Chemistry Forever aims to “disrupt” the dating app market in India by offering AI Face Verification to curb the proliferation of fake profiles.

The new app is coming out strong in terms of security, which has plagued the dating app industry for years. According to The Hindustan Times, the app has had over 10,000 downloads in its first two months (it had a soft launch in September of last year). So far most of the profiles on the app are verified, though users have the choice to opt-in for Face Verification. 

According to the company’s website, the registration process is simple. After downloading the app, it asks the user to upload a recent profile photo (to be verified later in the process), and offers users “stars” for each completed step of the process to make their profiles more appealing and complete.

Tinder has launched a new ad campaign in India called You Up, aimed directly at young singles to show them the fun, adventurous side of dating apps.

The ad focuses on a young woman looking for exciting new experiences, not necessarily a relationship, and there’s a magical element to her journey. The ad opens with her matching with a man, and she reaches into the app screen to take his hand as they jump off a building and into a karaoke bar where they have a fun, flirtatious night.

The next scene shows her matching with a woman, where they are in a parking lot dancing and then take a drive together, a slower and more romantic experience. She matches with another man after this, where they take a swim in the ocean before she drops him at the train station - and before meeting her next date.

Dating app Bumble has launched a new series of videos catering to countries within the Asian-Pacific (APAC) market, specifically India, Singapore, and The Philippines, to lessen the stigma surrounding its dating app premise: that women make the first move.

APAC countries, especially India, are fast-growing markets for dating apps as younger daters opt for technology over traditional dating methods like matchmaking. However, approaches to dating and matchmaking vary greatly between countries according to Lucille McCart, communications director for Bumble APAC said in an interview with The Drum. For example, religion and religious customs are more important in Singapore and the Philippines compared to markets like Australia and New Zealand.

As a result, Bumble has launched new videos catering to specific markets. The videos for Singapore and the Philippines are called “It Starts With Hello,” designed to create more levels of comfort for women starting a chat over the app. “In Singapore, 87% of people surveyed believed that men should take the lead and only 7% said that this is what is expected of women. Things are slowly changing in this regard, and Bumble is here to advocate for further progress,” McCart told The Drum.

OkCupid recently surveyed its users regarding their attitudes about dating going into 2023, finding that singles are more interested in open relationships and discussions about sex.

OkCupid had nearly 10 billion responses to matching questions in 2022 which revealed what singles will be looking for in 2023.

In addition to the pandemic’s impact on dating habits in general, younger daters are driving conversation around mental health, sober dating, and attitudes towards relationships and sex, according to OkCupid’s blog. Open relationships have been around for a while, but now young daters are challenging the stigma that has always been attached to them. Over the summer, OkCupid found that there was a 26 percent increase in mentions of “ENM” or “ethical non-monogamy” compared to the beginning of 2022, and a 42 percent increase compared to last summer.

Attitudes towards open relationships have shifted globally – with 30 percent of OkCupid users saying they would be interested in an open relationship (about 8.5 million singles), with Gen Z and Millennial daters being the most interested in ENM. The numbers are highest among European daters, with 49 percent of singles in Spain saying they would consider an open relationship, 46 percent in Switzerland, 40 percent in the Netherlands, 39 percent in Germany, and 37 percent in Italy. Brazil, Australia, and Canada had 35 percent, 34 percent and 31 percent of users interested in open relationships, respectively.