Features

It was really only a matter of time.

Beards have become such an integral part of pop culture it's almost surprising this hasn't happened sooner. Finally, the world has a dating app for men with beards and those who love them. The app is called Bristlr, because we now live in an era when E is an uncool vowel.

On the surface, Bristlr is exactly what you think it is. The app is a slightly tongue-in-cheek service that taps into the hipster/lumbersexual thing that's happening right now, and has no problem laughing at itself. The description of how Bristlr works is simply:

• Tell us where you are, and if you have a beard
• Got a beard? We find people looking for beards
• Want a beard? We find people with beards worth looking for
• Send messages to people you like and who like you
• Your life now contains more beard love, you're welcome

And then there's the to-the-point explanation of what Bristlr is: “There are many people with beards who like to have them stroked. And there are many people who don’t have beards, but would like to stroke them. Bristlr is the link between the two.”

And let's not forget the handy FAQ answer to “Is this a joke?” which reads: “In the sense that it’s a little ridiculous, yes. But Bristlr is a real thing being made.”

So yeah, it's a little funny. And Bristlr knows it's a little funny. And that's why it stands to be totally great.

Actually, it's just one of the reasons Bristlr could be your new favorite dating site. Although the premise is just the slightest bit silly, Bristlr is taking on some issues that are absolutely serious. Chief among them is the problem of spam. No matter who you are or what dating services you've used, you're bound to have come across the kind of lame, boring, generic messages that you know have been copy/pasted to tons of other people.

But not on Bristlr, because Bristlr informs you when a message has been sent to other people, as well as how many other people it's been sent to. It isn't complicated functionality to make, but Bristlr is one of – if not the – first to actually do it. Cool, right?

In addition to that handy little tool, Bristlr also lets users grade the quality of the messages they receive. If people regularly rate you highly, indicating that you spend a thoughtful amount of time on your messages, you'll receive a little star on your profile.

Founder John Kershaw says he's also considering adding Facebook-style status updates to the site, to encourage even more personality, honesty and transparency.

Honesty and transparency on dating sites? Yes, apparently it is possible. Thanks, Bristlr.

Get out of the pajamas. Put down the Seamless delivery containers. Log out of Netflix. It's time to make a change around here.

If you've been avoiding online dating like the plague, no one would blame you. Sometimes it feels like online dating is a plague, except instead of the usual symptoms this plague comes with shirtless mirror selfies, terrible pickup lines, and unwanted dick pics.

Luckily, there's a new crop of dating apps designed to prevent exactly that. These apps hope to decrease the creep factor that's keeping many women away from mobile dating, by offering women more control over the process. Try out these five female-friendly dating apps in 2015:

Tinder who? Dating app Hinge has been on a slow climb uphill, but is gathering a lot of momentum as it goes. The app has broadened its reach beyond the initial major cities, which helped build not only its user base but also its brand as a serious competitor to Tinder.

This month, the app also made Time Magazine’s “Top 10 apps of 2014,” beating out the sensationally popular Kim Kardashian Hollywood despite the fact it made $100 million this year alone. (Tinder did not make the list.) Time took a dig at Tinder, noting: “Hinge sparked a flame in 2014 as it spread to more and more cities around the U.S…[Its] matchmaking connects to your Facebook account to foster friend-of-a-friend connections, a novel concept in a sea of dating apps that prioritize immediate, nearby and mostly anonymous relationships.”

Now Hinge is launching version 3.2, and due to audience demand is starting to change some of its policies, allowing for greater access to matches. Instead of providing potential matches once a day at noon, you can now view them at your convenience throughout the day. (I’m guessing this is to get people to log in more than once a day as opposed to creating a daily traffic jam.)

Hinge is also offering more matches per day. Unlike Tinder which provides an endless array of matches whenever you log in, Hinge is more particular, mostly because it has a more limited network to pull from – namely, your Facebook social circles. In order for Hinge to match you, you have to have a Facebook friend in common. (This probably encourages users to add more Facebook friends to their network, too.)

The app began in Washington D.C. and made its way to major cities including New York, San Francisco and Los Angeles. Hinge has further expanded its territories in recent months – adding St. Paul and Minneapolis, Omaha, Indianapolis, St. Louis, Miami, Tampa, Orlando, Denver, Seattle, Houston and Austin.

According to a recent article in Wired, the company has experienced 500% growth since January. While it isn’t doing Tinder’s numbers in terms of downloads and number of matches per day, the company feels its more measured growth is a better indication of its potential for long-term success.

What is in store for Hinge in 2015? On December 11th, the company announced that it raised an additional $12 million, which will help its expansion into even more cities, including its first launch into international territory in February, when it debuts in London.

Hinge is definitely a dating app to follow. For more details on this dating app you can read our Hinge review.

Dating apps like Tinder have taken the dating world by storm – and some argue have rendered traditional online dating a thing of the past. While sites like Match.com and eHarmony offer matches based on preferences and compatibility, Tinder offers the ability to look at a photo and instantly decide whether or not you’re interested.

In a recent article in Business Insider, eHarmony’s Vice President of Brand Marketing Grant Langston looked at Tinder’s success as a boost to his business. For instance, he’s seen a surge of new subscriptions since Tinder launched in Australia – 2.5 million members, up from 2 million the same time last year.

“The press [Tinder is] receiving is bringing lots of people to the online dating world, including people that find Tinder isn’t the right choice for them,” Langston told Business Insider. “Globally, this trend has helped us tap into new markets and led to an increase in our membership numbers.”

But why are more people choosing eHarmony when Tinder seems to be taking off? For one thing, Langston argues that people who would have never joined an online dating site before find it a little easier to start when they use a dating app. It’s made online dating in general lose its stigma.

Langston also attributes the surge in subscriptions to the high quality matchmaking that is eHarmony’s business model, compared to Tinder’s superficial match-making process. With Tinder, choosing a match is entirely dependent on photos and a couple of sentences, which aren’t much better odds for finding love than meeting someone at a bar. There isn’t necessarily any kind of compatibility – aside from that initial physical attraction.

People who are matched on eHarmony however, are compatible in specific ways. Matches aren’t made via liking the same music or TV shows or someone’s photo, but based on similar dispositions and compatible personalities – which is a bit more complex and relational. Langston says that eHarmony’s matching creates a foundation for a relationship to start, where Tinder is more fleeting, intended for a hook-up. So when people are disappointed with the matches they are meeting through Tinder, they look to other more serious online dating options, which is when they gravitate to eHarmony.

Langston also noted that eHarmony’s growth in the past year has been due to young professionals ages 23-33 flocking to the site, looking for people who are more compatible whether or not they are looking to marry.

According to Langston, eHarmony owes much of its recent success to the fact that Tinder isn’t producing many serious relationships. Then again, it seems that despite the appeal of Tinder, people are looking for something deeper.

Every new dating app on the market is trying to compete with Tinder’s soaring popularity. The only problem is, not many differentiate themselves enough to do it effectively. Most of the new apps have the same basic concept – swiping through photos of people nearby, seeing who you might want to message. Clover wants to do things a bit differently in the latest version of its dating app.

Clover launched back in April 2014 with little fanfare, but recently they have debuted a new feature to try and distinguish themselves from the Tinder-like apps. While many people enjoy “Tinder-ing, ” there is still a gap between what people expect from an online dating site or app and what they actually get – leading to much disappointment. Fortunately, this problem might persuade daters to try new apps – hoping to find the right formula for dating success.

Part of the problem Clover execs noticed with Tinder is that people weren’t actually meeting up in real life – they were just scrolling and messaging. So they decided to make Clover focused on getting to the actual date - but with simplicity and ease like Tinder, rather than complicated matching algorithms and a long communication process like traditional dating sites.

Instead of encouraging people to just scroll through photos, Clover’s newest version includes an “on-demand” feature that allows you to meet matches IRL (in real life) more quickly. It works like this: you pick a date and time in the calendar and where you want to meet (your favorite bar, restaurant, etc.), and the app suggests a potential prospect to join you. You then decide if you’d like to spend your time with him/her. If you do, the date is confirmed and all you have to do is show up on time.

“Our new on-demand service will find people that actually want to meet you and you’ll be able to find a date as easy as it is to order a pizza or a cab,” says Clover CEO Isaac Raichyk.

Raichyk argues that it is difficult to actually go on a date using other apps or even dating sites like OkCupid. Just because people are matched doesn’t mean that they will make the effort to meet. So why not do it more organically by confirming a date and time to see if there’s chemistry between you in person rather than waste more time texting back and forth for nothing.

While this sounds really good in theory, the app will have to prove itself in practice. The premium service is free for users to download and test for a week, but after that, it will cost you $9.99 per month - a hefty fee compared to most apps, but cheaper than online dating subscriptions and personal matchmakers. There are also certain pay-to-play features like a $.99 charge to change your name/ handle. The new on-demand feature however will be included in the free version.

Dating website OkCupid has always been considered more cutting edge among the most popular online dating sites, and it is maintaining this effective strategy. Now, the company is offering its users even more choices when it comes to how they gender-identify, and what their sexual preferences are.

OkCupid’s main appeal is its approach to online dating, much more progressive than traditional sites, and also more fun to navigate. People are encouraged ask each other questions and be more original and unique without being forced to just fill in the blanks for their profiles or being walked through a long questionnaire.  

In other words, instead of being “guided” through a process, OkCupid users have always been given a little more freedom to interact and express themselves how they’d like. This works for users, and it works for OkCupid, too. The company started a blog using data from its own user base that reveals online dating trends and preferences that have come in very handy over the years. It helped OkCupid to offer a premium paid service based on the things people want – like filtering out people who don’t fit their physical ideals. One of its founders recently published a book with his findings about patterns and habits of people who online date, gained from tracking its own users.

So it is only fitting that OkCupid would be on the forefront of offering more choices when it comes to dating and how people describe themselves and what they want. After all, we don’t fit into neat little boxes, especially when it comes to love.

OkCupid’s first new offering allows people more choices for how they identify themselves, other than just as “man” or “woman.” Gender has now been extended to include agender, androgynous, cis man, cis woman, genderfluid, gender non-conforming, hjra, intersex, trans man, trans woman and two spirit, among others.

A person’s sexual orientation is no longer limited to straight, gay, and bi-sexual. Now users can choose among an abundance of choices, including asexual, demisexual, heteroflexible, homoflexible, pansexual, queer, questioning and sapiosexual (one who finds intelligence to be the most important sexual trait).

Right now, these options have only been rolled out to a limited number of users, and the company hasn’t announced when (or if) they will be extending it to all users.

According to website NewNowNext, users were notified of the change in a message from OkCupid: “You’re part of a select group with access to this feature. Keep in mind as we continue to work on this feature: For now, editing your gender and orientation is only supported on the desktop site.”

OkCupid has a reported 3.5 million user base.