Canada

Bumble disclosed in an exclusive to website Bustle that they will soon be launching a new feature called BumbleSpots to help its members meet face-to-face.

BumbleSpots offers Bumble-verified locations where its members can meet so they feel safe grabbing a drink with a match for the first time IRL. It’s a new way for the female-friendly dating app to appeal to its prime market: single women.

Getting people to meet in person instead of messaging each other over a dating app is no small feat. Tinder and Hinge have been trying different approaches to get users to meet face to face, but it’s still a difficult proposition. This is especially tough for female daters, who feel unsafe meeting strangers at locations or neighborhoods that are unfamiliar. Bumble wants to remove as many barriers as possible for women to feel more empowered in the online dating process - not only to reach out via a dating app, but also initiate meeting in person.

Since the announcement of Facebook Dating at the company’s annual F8 developer conference in May, the online dating industry has anxiously awaited the arrival of its newest competitor. Facebook began testing its matchmaking product internally in August, revealing a few key features in leaked screenshots, then went live for users in Colombia in September.

Canada and Thailand are the latest nations to take Facebook Dating for a test drive. The feature launched in the two countries earlier this month, along with several updates that aim to enhance the dating experience.

The first update is Second Look, a tool that will be familiar to some users of other dating services. Second Look, as its name implies, allows users to reconsider matches they have previously passed on by going back through their Suggested Matches or reviewing profiles they may have accidentally rejected. Similar “do-over” features can be found on services like OkCupid and Tinder, but it is often limited to members with paid subscriptions.

Celebrities aren’t immune to the pervasive popularity of online dating. Despite their fame, stars like Tiffany Haddish, Charlize Theron, Zac Efron, Martha Stewart, Chace Crawford, Katy Perry, Demi Lovato, and Andy Cohen have admitted to experimenting with dating apps. There’s even Raya - an exclusive app designed just for celebrity singles.

But here’s a name we never expected to see associated with online dating: Norm Macdonald.

The Canadian comedian has made a radical departure from stand-up and SNL to co-create a dating app with serial entrepreneur Vivek Jain. The app, called Loko, places the focus on meeting face-to-face with video-only profiles. This helps matches make genuine first impressions based on personality, the founders claim, and eliminates several major problems faced by online daters.

Tinder has announced that users will be able to add Bitmoji when messaging matches.

The popular dating app is utilizing the personalized-avatar service Bitmoji to help users be a little more creative and expressive when they communicate and share with their matches. Previously, Tinder did not allow users to send any images in messages to other matches because of potential abuse and sensitive content (a.k.a. “dick pics”). Users had to rely on curated photos (up to nine total per profile) to express their personalities and preferences, which many people felt was insufficient for something as personal as online dating.

Adding Bitmoji cartoons and caricatures allows users to be creative and express themselves to matches without worrying about the potential problems of sharing photos.

Popular dating app Tinder is testing a new feature called Feed, aimed at providing users more insight to their matches, and to help spark conversations.

Feed consists of a real-time feed of social media posts from a user’s matches, specifically posts from Instagram and Spotify. The idea is that users can look at what their matches are virtually sharing moment by moment to get a better idea of what they are like – what they are listening to at any given time, where they are, and what they like doing.

The new feature will appear as a tab in the messages screen, according to website Tech Crunch. Users can respond directly to posts in their Feed without having to go back to the profile screen, making it easy to interact. Instead of having to be too descriptive in the profile, or thinking of something unique to say as an introduction, users can let their Instagram photos and playlists speak for themselves.

Though the US Presidential Election is over, the nation remains deeply divided along party lines. Many Americans have made jokes about moving to Canada in the past, but this week, the Canadian immigration website’s server broke down because of all the traffic from unhappy American voters.

Enter Maple Match, a dating app which matches Americans and Canadians for potential romance. The company took an opportunity to make lemonade out of political lemons.

Maple Match was beta testing its service earlier this year, and this month seized the opportunity to launch its new app to help Americans feeling less than happy with their country’s choices. The app's tagline is “make dating great again,” similar to the slogan for President-elect Donald Trump’s campaign.

Maple Match’s technology is straightforward. It offers the same photo-based profile that Tinder does, but there is no swiping. You indicate your citizenship and your desired citizenship, and then you can look through potential matches and start messaging whomever you like.