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What really happens inside a dating app

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111–120 of 373 posts

Re: What really happens inside a dating app

#111
Funny thing is that when dating apps used to be "browse profiles, send message", nobody had to debate inner workings. Users could self select people of interest, send them a message directly, and know there'd be a very good chance that their profile/message would at least be seen.

Issue today is that apps control visibility, both in terms of profiles and likes. I've tried Hinge a few times. Did like a 4 month initial stint that had me consistently matching/meeting very attractive women (ones in the standouts section), tried it again a year later under a paid plan and had one mediocre match in 2 weeks (same photos and profile).

Skimmed the article so maybe this was addressed, but there's dark patterns happening on these apps, or faulty algos, or both.

Re: What really happens inside a dating app

#112
The qualities that women find attractive in men cannot be captured in a static profile on a website ... plus most of the men in that site are there because they don't have those qualities.

Let's just say that if you can open your mouth enough to say hi to a woman without hesitation, you are completely wasting your time on dating sites.

Re: What really happens inside a dating app

#113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This one is classic: > Girls would say, red flag if a guy has shirtless pictures and then liking profiles where guys were shirtless. This is surprising: > In our case we had even acquisition in terms of male/female, but the retention of girls is lower than that of men, so you end up with 66% men and 34% women. 2:1 men to woman is a far better ratio than what most people claim (5:1 is usually thrown around with no evi…

> For girls you need to lower your standards and force you to go on a date with guys that you dont have the flame for (it is actually very hard to do that for a girl, very very hard) I kind of didn't understand the logic behind how he got there. According to the article women get more matches then they know what to do with. Why would lowering your standards in such an environment be a good strategy?

The article is a bit a of jumble of thoughts, but I believe that advice is aimed at girls who aren't liking and therefore not matching. Some lines that mention this particular grouping:

> Only 50% of girls sent 10 likes in their account lifespan.

> 10% of girls that finish the onboarding never send any pass or like, ...

> We have plenty of girls that can scroll through 300 profiles and not like anyone and deleting their account saying "I dont like anyone" well

Re: What really happens inside a dating app

#114

My anecdotal user-end data-science-ish story about dating apps: A few years back I was single and on Hinge a fair amount. If you used Hinge back then, you'll remember some key differences between the platform and other dating apps: 1) when you "like"'d someone, you'd have to comment on a specific part of their profile (a photo, a prompt answer, etc), 2) these likes showed up in their inbox, independent of whether the…

> don't these people work?

They do! 2-3 p.m. is around the time people get fidgety at work and start looking at the clock, checking their phones, and such. They are no longer at lunch. Whatever busywork they had to rush through in the morning is done.

Re: What really happens inside a dating app

#115
post #4

> Recommendation of profiles that you may like is a solved technical challenge at Tinder level and at mostly any dating app today. It’s hard to take the rest of the article seriously after reading this!

I disagree. "The algorithm" is understood by everyone in 2025 to be a more-or-less perfect attention hoarder. TikTok, Insta, YouTube, etc. have proven they can definitely surface the content that users will like. I see no reason why profiles would be different.

They know what you like, but remember they want to make money. You finding success means you are probably less likely to get desperate and pay for premium options on their app. They drip feed you as little success as possible to still keep you on the app, but make you desperate.

It sucks, but a dating app doesn't want you successful, they want you to use their app for as long as possible.

Re: What really happens inside a dating app

#116

> You would need to be a pro at user interviews to really get interesting feedback. (Well maybe this is the norm in B2C but at the end of the day user interviews were of no help). This shouldn’t be surprising. Interviewing humans is a skill. Doing so in a product context, and learning useful things from it, is not easy. I hope they don’t approach other things this way. “You’d need to be a professional plumber to stop…

"The trouble with market research is that people don't think what they feel, they don't say what they think and they don't do what they say."

Market research and observational/UX research are not the same. Market research looks for trends in bulk; UX research looks for individual actions and preferences. The difference is important, and it’s lost on the article’s author.

In UX research you don’t ask people what they want or what they like, you (e.g.) put them in front of software/prototypes, give them tasks, and watch them work. What you learn in this context is _why_ people do things; it’s hard to get that from metrics.

You also don’t get new product ideas from customers. There are aphorisms 100 hundred years old about that which everyone should know: “If I asked my customers what they wanted they would have said, ‘A faster horse.’”

Re: What really happens inside a dating app

#117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This one is classic: > Girls would say, red flag if a guy has shirtless pictures and then liking profiles where guys were shirtless. This is surprising: > In our case we had even acquisition in terms of male/female, but the retention of girls is lower than that of men, so you end up with 66% men and 34% women. 2:1 men to woman is a far better ratio than what most people claim (5:1 is usually thrown around with no evi…

> For girls you need to lower your standards and force you to go on a date with guys that you dont have the flame for (it is actually very hard to do that for a girl, very very hard) I kind of didn't understand the logic behind how he got there. According to the article women get more matches then they know what to do with. Why would lowering your standards in such an environment be a good strategy?

Lowering your standards will find guys who aren't just interested in sex. The problem is that most women want the same (small proportion of) men. He said that the more matches a man gets, the more likely he'll just want sex and not a relationship. So you go for the less desired men and you find better quality matches, if you are looking for more than casual relations.

Re: What really happens inside a dating app

#118
We built a dating app and saw these same metrics.

Our "twist" was that anyone could be a matchmaker, pairing other people (in addition to our recommendation engine).

An interesting thing happened: lot's of people just like using dating apps in a voyeuristic way, with no intention of dating.

Tinder eventually launched this feature, but it fell flat.

I still think there's merit to human-based recs over "AI" matchmakers.

Re: What really happens inside a dating app

#119
post #98
post #85

> Among girls : 10% where lesbian, 84% were hetero and 12 % were interested in both genders > Among guys: 7% homo, 92% hetero and almost none were interested in both genders That's insane.

As a bi person who's currently a man, but considering transition, I can't help but wonder if maybe all the bi guys are just... picking up and leaving to become bi gals :P

I think nonbinary people are the most likely to be attracted to many genders.

And women are more likely to be attracted to many genders.

Men are more likely to be attracted to just men (and perhaps nonbinary people) or to just women (and perhaps nonbinary people)

But I think this is due to social conditioning more than something like biological predisposition. Social attitudes on men and masculinity are not very encouraging of same-sex attraction, it's very common for men to get lumped into "gay" or straight". Whereas I think women and non-binary people are more often encouraged to explore queer sexuality or even expected to (well, I suppose gender-queer people by definition have queer sexuality also). Men are also more conditioned to be more competitive in general, and to view other men as sexual/romantic competition.

I'm a man who's a little bit queer, and many of my friends are queer, so my experience is likely influenced by my crowd, but I know many more gender-queer, nonbinary, gender-fluid, and gender-nonconforming people than I know trans-men and trans-women. The AMAB people I know who aren't gay men, and have nevertheless recognized some degree of attraction to men, very often are not male-identified. But I think it's much more common for them to be gender-queer than to be women. But again, this may coincide with me knowing more NB people than binary trans people in general.

For AMAB people who acknowledge their attraction to men (but are not gay men), I do think this awareness of a sexual identity that, in men, is less socially encouraged/understood often leads to questioning the value of identification as a man entirely (especially since the male identity has so much baggage already).

Re: What really happens inside a dating app

#120
post #2

> To me, if you are a guy on a dating app and your pictures are not taken by a professional photographer then you are losing your time, and if you are paying you are also throwing your money. Don't do this. You need good pictures that convey attractiveness (looks, as well as personality). Using professional photos conveys neediness & a level of desperation hidden under a shell of an ego the shot tries to portray. So…

Tangentially related: but I find professional headshots on LinkedIn also kind of weird…
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