Bumble Inc

Singles are gravitating towards more targeted dating apps and moving away from the one-size-fits-all platforms like Tinder and Bumble.

According to an article in The Financial Times, specialty apps like Grindr (which serves gay and bisexual men) and Feeld (which serves those looking for non-traditional relationships), are seeing downloads and new users increase. Investors are noticing and are looking to these apps rather than the one-size-fits-all dating apps dominating the market.

Tinder and Bumble have seen a decline in downloads and paying users, which has rattled investors. According to the FT, Match Group which owns Tinder has shed about a fifth of its market value since the beginning of 2023, compared to Grindr whose shares have more than doubled in the same time period.

Tinder, Bumble and Hinge have seen surges in downloads and user activity around the Athlete’s Village in Paris as the 2024 Summer Olympics get underway.

According to The Daily Mail, these dating apps have reported thousands of new downloads. Athletes have gravitated to dating apps in the past to hook up during the Olympics, with the exception of an intimacy ban in 2020 due to Covid concerns.

Paris officials have  a different agenda from athletes, providing single beds made of cardboard so that they would be discouraged from having so much sex during the competitions. This has created a lot of buzz on TikTok, with athletes testing out the sturdiness of the beds by jumping on them. (They don’t break or fall apart.)

A vast majority of 79 percent of Gen Z singles said they have experienced dating app burnout, according to a new study by Forbes Health.

The study found that in the last six months, 49 percent of those who reported burnout were using Tinder, followed by Plenty of Fish at 38 percent and Bumble at 29 percent. Raya users had the least amount of burnout reported, at only 3 percent.

“People who experience burnout with dating apps are exhausted from constantly meeting new people, failing opportunities and lies,” Dr. Rufus Spann, a sex therapist and Forbes Health Advisory Board member, said in an article about the study. “Over time, the unfortunate misgivings of being on a dating app can cause someone to lose hope in the dating process and finding the right person.”

Bumble has announced a new reporting feature for users to alert the app if they suspect a profile of displaying AI-generated photos and videos.

“Fake Profile” allows users to flag and report accounts that they think are AI-generated and being used to deceive other app users. According to Tech Crunch, people using AI to beef up their profiles is creating a new problem on dating apps (aside from the typical bots, spam accounts, and safety issues that have been around for a while) – and that is whether or not to believe that the person in the profile they are seeing is actually that person, or an AI-enhanced version of them.

For example, someone could generate a photo of themselves to make them look more like Taylor Swift, or alter their bodies to show muscles they don’t have in real life, hoping to attract more matches through deception. In other words, they are gaming the system with AI.

Hinge and Grindr are two standout dating apps as they continue to grow in a tough market; powerhouses Tinder and Bumble are seeing more users leave their platforms.

In general, dating apps have had a rough couple of years, with the coveted Gen Z market looking to other options besides dating apps to meet singles, including in-person events, running clubs, and social media platforms like LinkedIn.

“Online dating trends have continued to decelerate industry-wide, showing minimal relief from the recent struggles,” wrote Morgan Stanley analysts Nathan Feather and Brian Nowak in their research, according to Quartz.

A majority of dating platforms have signed on to a new dating safety code in Australia, in an effort to crack down on dating app users who violate policies.

According to News.com, dating app users who “harass, threaten, or share unwanted explicit photos” could have their accounts terminated across multiple platforms at the same time, intended to create a safer space overall for online dating. Seventy-five percent of companies operating in Australia have signed on to the new industry standard, including Match Group (which operates Tinder, Hinge and OkCupid among others), Bumble and Grindr.

A recurring problem with dating apps is user safety, specifically surrounding the growing number of users who receive unsolicited images. If a perpetrator is banned from one platform, they can easily move on to other platforms, so the new safety standard is intended to prevent this from happening.