Reddit bot won’t allow links to the quartz article, but here’s the chart reproduced from the article:
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|Group|Men|Woman|
|:-|:-|:-|
|Top 1%|16.4%|11.2%|
|Top 5%|41.1%|30.6%|
|Top 10%|58%|45.7%|
|Bottom 50%|4.3%|7.9%|
Wow, these are some… stark statistics. I knew it was bad for the average person, but I didn’t think it would be *that* bad. If you’re average looking, not even ugly, there’s almost no reason to use these apps at all. Surprisingly, although its twice as good for woman, that’s still alot less then what I’d thought.
Note: There’s alot of contention about whether 7.9% means double the matches for the average woman. Due to the gender imbalance on dating apps, it does not in fact mean double the matches. See u/[**buttercup612**](https://www.reddit.com/user/buttercup612/) post below to see how the gender imbalance effects the actual number of matches.
26 comments
Article name:
[These statistics show why it’s so hard to be an average man on dating apps](https://qz.com/1051462/these-statistics-show-why-its-so-hard-to-be-an-average-man-on-dating-apps/)
This data has to be taken with a grain of salt (when comparing to OLD overall) because Hinge is a VERY different dating app than bumble or Tinder. Even just the fact that a free user gets 10 likes (versus 100) changes this dynamic drastically.
I also have to imagine that female users of Hinge use their 10 daily likes more often than female users of Tinder use their 100 right swipes.
What does it mean by “bottom” what qualifications are they making up when compiling this data?
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And you have to take into account that the demographic is already skewed towards attractive people, because unattractive people don’t take part in this based on the amount of likes they get. So the top 5% of hinge is more like the top 3% of the real world (i can’t put a reliable number on that, obviously, but it’s less than 5%)
Good to see the difference it makes when you have limited “likes”. Turns out men are pickier when they can’t afford to just swipe right on everyone like they often do on other apps like tinder. This kind of seems like a good thing to me, you’re only matching with people who are more likely attracted to you then no?
I’ve never had a single like nor a match on Hinge, so go figure lol.
Looks like it’s really hard for average people in general?
Study is from 2017, is it still accurate?
Thank god I’m not on dating apps
I found my girlfriend on Hinge 🤷🏼♂️, this study is also 5 years old. OLD has changed significantly in the past couple years. I’m very average.
I feel like likes are a far more important metric for this conversation.
Hinge is weird. I only got 2 likes in 3 months, but had around 30 matches from the people I liked.
Also the amount of likely decent looking men on those apps with a slew of shitty, blurry selfies and no blurb is huge – I would say they alone account for the bottom half.
It’s not really surprising. We are evolved to want attractive mates. The whole dating app system right now is designed around images first, profile description second. So it’s no wonder attractiveness has such an effect on modern dating apps.
We need to design an app for the bottom 50% probably. Maybe make it profile description based rather than image based. Like you can’t see each other’s photos until you both consent later in the process. I think a lot of people who swipe base on attractiveness would avoid this theoretical app thus helping people who want less image based online dating. Just a thought
I love how leading the title is given it’s pretty much the same for men and women.
Will y’all give it up already sheesh!
So? It’s good that women are not settling for mediocre, ugly men. What’s your point? We SHOULD want the best of the best to raise our future generations.
How does this ven make sense when it’s also only 8 percent for the bottom 50% of women. Does everyone just only like the top 10%?
So isn’t the problem easily fixed if both lower half start liking each other?
Or am I stupid here?
Because these apps prioritize visual traits over anything else. Just pick up girls in real life. There, not only looks play a part but also the way you present yourself, body language, tone, skills, etc.
But for women it’s about the same????
I am a proof of being in bottom 50 percent .. 8 years in dating apps ( all kinds) and not even one date or a gf
Once I changed my pictures around to more high quality ones it made that much of a difference.
If you’re not above average, both men and women have it pretty tough it looks like.
Whats interesting is that below average women also aren’t getting matches either. Less attractive men and women are trying to match with people out of their league. Good news for you is most people have terrible profiles so your competition sucks.
Men who assume all women are swimming in matches should take a look at this also.
Are you sure it means matches and not likes?
Aviv Goldgeier, an engineer for the dating website Hinge, recently analyzed the share of “likes” on Hinge that went to the most-liked people of each gender.
EDIT: This data is misleading. It says that the bottom 50% of men typically don’t get unsolicited likes. It DOES NOT mean that the bottom 50% of men only get 4% of all matches.
This guy explained it better.
[https://www.reddit.com/r/hingeapp/comments/f9ncke/comment/fixpzm7/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3](https://www.reddit.com/r/hingeapp/comments/f9ncke/comment/fixpzm7/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3)
“As a below-average looking male, I get hardly any unsolicited likes, and I have never matched with any of them because they usually aren’t appealing to me, but that has no impact whatsoever on my ability to match and date, because all of my matches come from sending likes. For ME, my “currency” is my match/response rate, which seems fairly high, or at least enough so that I am steadily able to find dates when I put the effort in.”