TALKING Spark with new Tinder features
Dating app Tinder on Tuesday added more ways for people to get to know each other from afar before meeting in a world changed by the pandemic.
“People want to take more time to get to know somebody virtually before deciding that they want to match and meet offline,” chief executive Jim Lanzone said.
The smartphone app for finding love, whether it be fleeting or life-long, unveiled new features including playful “Hot Takes”: multiple-choice questions to see whether users’ “flirty banter” is in sync.
Tinder is also providing an option to add video clips to user profiles to provide glimpses of people’s lives, interests or adventures.
As the pandemic accelerated trends of remote work, learning and socialising, it also gave momentum to cultivating new relationships more deeply online before committing to connecting in the real world, according to Lanzone.
“Twenty-somethings today want something a little bit different, which is more substantive and more virtual-first. That trend, generationally, was pre-Covid. Then Covid just really cemented it across all generations.”
The Gen Z demographic, referring to people in their early 20s, accounts for more than half of Tinder’s users, according to the company.
“The ultimate need for people is to meet offline, and to have a real relationship in the real world,” Lanzone said.”
How they get to that point and the tools they use to get to that point have shifted.
“Tinder makes its money from subscriptions that provide more features than the basic free access to the platform. The app is available in some 190 countries. Owned by Match Group, Tinder boasts being the top dating app in the US and elsewhere. – AFP