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Let’s dive into the data and see what we can learn about finding love and staying safe.
Where are all the single people?
More than half of all adults under 30 have used a dating app, but which one? Tinder is the most popular dating app — about half of US adults who date online say they’ve used the service. Match and Bumble are the second and third most popular options. Tinder and Bumble were the youngest singles in the 18- to 29-year-old crowd, while Match and eHarmony were the oldest staples with the 50-and-over crowd. Overall, only 35 percent of all online daters reported paying for an app subscription or additional features.
Lesbian, gay and bisexual users are slightly more likely than straight singles to use dating services, choosing Tinder, Grindr and other apps the most.
The study looked at the eight biggest players, including OkCupid, eHarmony, Hinge, Grindr and HER, but more niche dating apps are also a popular option. Combined, these “other” apps were used by 31 percent of daters, including OurTime, an app for over-50s, Christian apps Plenty of Fish and Christian Mingle, and Facebook Dating.
What are people really looking for on dating apps?
Are most people looking for a quick sexual encounter or a lasting Frank and Bill type of love? According to a Pew survey, 44 percent of online daters say they are looking for a long-term partner, 40 percent are interested in casual dating, 24 percent want to have casual sex, and 22 percent are just interested in friendship. Significantly more men than women reported using apps to find casual sex.
Do dating apps work for finding a partner?
If you are looking for a partner, how likely are you to find one on the Internet? More people think dating apps make finding a partner more difficult, and younger people are the most optimistic about their chances. According to the study, 1 in 10 adults in a committed partnership say they met on an online dating service.
Younger, and lesbian, gay and bisexual users were more likely to find lasting relationships on the apps. 20 percent of under-30s said they met their significant others online, and 24 percent of lesbian, gay and bisexual respondents said they found their partners there.
In the United States, 69 percent of people describe themselves as being in a partnership whether married, cohabiting or otherwise committed.
Daters are divided about the experience of finding potential matches online. 53 percent said they had a positive experience with the apps, while 46 percent said there were more negative takeaways.
Interestingly, women have more negative experiences with online dating than men. One reason is that women are more likely to suffer on services. A majority of the 38 percent of online daters who reported receiving unwanted sexually explicit messages or photos were women. According to Pew, women were more likely to be approached, called offensive names and threatened with physical harm after they said they weren’t interested.
About two-thirds of women between the ages of 18 and 50 experienced at least one of these types of harassment, compared to one-third of men in the same age group. Women were also likely to be overwhelmed by the number of messages they received.
Black users were more likely than white users to send explicit images or messages, and lesbian, gay, and bisexual daters faced all forms of harassment compared to straight daters. Overall, white users were more likely to say online dating was safe than black, Hispanic, and Asian adults.
More US women (57 percent) than men (41 percent) say dating apps are not a completely safe way to meet people. Older daters are generally more skeptical about the safety of online dating. What can make the experience safer? A majority of users across all demographics feel that apps require background checks to create an online dating profile.
It’s not just other people concerned about safety, however. Dating apps are full of bots and scams, especially romance scams where someone poses as a potential romantic partner to get money. Men report being targeted by dating app scams more often than women.
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