The bell is tolling for the swipe. Last week, Bumble founder and CEO Whitney Wolfe Herd told Axios that the company would remove the swiping feature that’s defined dating app culture for the last decade. The app will also no longer require women to message first in heterosexual matches, a definitive feature that set Bumble apart from many of its competitors.
A major platform shifting away from the swipe’s gamification of dating seems to warrant a sigh of relief, but the question remains: what will take its place? Is there a better solution that can bring people back to dating apps?
It’s been clear for a while that young adults are jaded with tech-assisted dating, with various surveys citing “dating app burnout” and increased interest in matchmaking services. Bumble’s internal data shows this, too: TechCrunch reports that the company is planning “a big overhaul meant to win back Gen Z” as paying users are down over 20% from a year ago.
“People are feeling exhausted, they’re feeling fatigued,” Wolfe Herd told Axios. “They feel like the swipe has degraded their love lives.”
So what is Bumble’s big plan to make dating apps exciting and effective again? Artificial intelligence, naturally.
Bumble is currently testing an AI dating assistant feature called Bee, which will collect data about a user’s interests and dating preferences to find more compatible matches. This integration will also power Dates, an AI experience that is “designed to help you move from match to meeting IRL — without losing momentum along the way.”
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That’s all well and good, until you understand that Gen Z feels increasingly skeptical and even angry about the proliferation of AI. Many do use it, but it’s not necessarily coming from the desire to engage with the technology so much as it feels like a necessity to stay up to date and gain a sense of fluency. I can’t imagine young adults who are sick of dating apps and tired of AI will suddenly feel their love life is rejuvenated when those two are combined.
Bumble has yet to fully roll out its new AI-powered platform, so it’s impossible to say how effective replacing the swipe with robo-matchmaking will be. But it also seems clear that throwing more tech at the problem isn’t going to be a cure-all, especially while many young adults are experiencing what some have deemed an “intimacy crisis.” Young people are craving connection, whether it’s dating meet-cutes or simply in-office work, and at the same time feeling emotionally taxed and economically and socially strained. Meeting other humans in the real world, without a pay-to-play AI matchmaker, feels like a better starting point.
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