Are dating apps worth it?

Bre (No)

Users are often highly dissatisfied with the dating app experience. Most have found themselves burned out, deleting apps following the stress, overwhelm, and disappointment they can induce. Dating apps promote a superficial culture of low-commitment snap judgments that commodify connections. Quick, surface-level matches offer low satisfaction and poor odds of meaningful encounters. 

Apps also make cheating easy, pushing the idea of countless other options at our disposal. Unsurprisingly, married couples who met on dating apps report less stable relationships. Dating apps are even linked to feelings of rejection and loneliness. Studies show that excess swiping exacerbates the fear of being single. They encourage callous entitlement and contribute to low self-esteem, anxiety, and depression. Due to unrealistically skewed standards, most women face unwanted advances, while half of men feel excluded altogether.

Perhaps most obviously, dating apps can be dangerous. Researchers often compare their addictive nature to slot machines. There’s no accountability, such as the rating system used by Uber. Misrepresentations and exaggerations are common, making apps a hotbed for catfish, cybercriminals, and scammers. Alarmingly in one study, over one-third of women reported being sexually assaulted by someone they met on a dating app, the majority having been raped.

Dating apps are designed to hook users with subscription traps. They bait people with a better experience behind a paywall, teed up by an intentionally awful basic version. They’re known to sell users’ data, and since roughly half of all the apps are owned by only two companies, they can share personal information across multiple platforms.

All that risk for services that have only resulted in about 10% of all committed relationships simply doesn’t seem worth it. No wonder downloads are down; most people would rather meet someone offline anyway.

Sheryll (Yes)

Dating apps understandably have a bad reputation in some circles, but as a concept, they’re still valuable to meeting new friends, significant others, or even the one. Dating apps primarily bridge connections across borders—whether local, state, or international. This expands the potential circle of partners, meaning a person has a better chance of meeting and starting a relationship with someone they are compatible with. 

Dating apps also save time. They let users filter out traits that will be deal breakers for them, which allows people to choose not to commit to partners that don’t share essential values or lifestyle choices. Because users also know why they are there, it skips the awkward phase of figuring out if someone is single and available. Being able to talk to multiple potential partners at the same time is also another plus. It lets users meet more people and only go on dates with those they likeliest to resonate with.

Because of this, dating apps are safer. They let users evaluate each other through linked social media profiles, pictures, and biographies before agreeing to meet in person. This means that, on some level, users can get to know who they’re meeting before they go on a date. 

Finally, dating apps work, as more and more relationships have originated from apps, even leading to lasting commitments, such as in marriage. Statistically, online dating has become the likeliest way couples meet, over any other conventional metric. If someone wants to find a significant other or a date, it's hard to beat the practicality of dating apps.