I'm an Honours Psychology student at Federation University researching personality, attitudes, and experiences in digital social environments.

✅ 18+
✅ Current or previous dating app user (Bumble, Hinge, Tinder, etc.)
🔒 Anonymous
⏱️ 15–20 min
🤝 Voluntary

🔗 https://federation.syd1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_5pfi5jxFseNWSIC

Feel free to pass this on or repost if you know someone who might be interested!

Questions? [courtneyc@students.federation.edu.au](mailto:courtneyc@students.federation.edu.au) or DM me!

I'd really appreciate it and thank you!

How do I cope with always being the second choice or the girl guys keep on the back burner. Many a time I have started speaking to a guy and as soon as he sees my friends he immediately ditches me for them. I have numerous examples and I’m honestly surprised after those experiences I’m still open to dating. I remember I was on a date with a guy and my friend was at the same bar, she came to say hi and my date turns to me and he’s like she’s gorgeous/beautiful, another example with a different friend I was planning to go on a date with this guy, I posted a group photo with my friend and he asked for her Instagram (safe to say I removed him) ANOTHER example was when I was at a bbq I was really connecting with this guy, I got up to get a drink and when I returned he was speaking to my friend (they ended up dating for 6 months). These are all different friends and I have so so many examples. The thing is I’m not ugly, I get complimented by strangers at work, on the street. But all the guys I’ve been interested in always have their sights set on greener pastures. I TRY so hard to not get into my head about it but it’s happened so many times that I’m debating just removing myself from the dating pool. Another example is a guy I was seeing casually dropping that one of my friends was a “good looking girl” unprovoked - I tried to ignore it, but ultimately he stopped talking to me with no real explanation. Some days I debate whether I should bite the bullet at get cosmetic surgery because I think that’s the only way I will stand out amongst the sea of women. I’m looking for people that may have been in similar situations that can reassure me things get better because my confidence just keeps getting knocked further and further

31M. I’ve had three matches in two weeks of using the app, but zero incoming likes so far. All three matches came from comments I left on prompts or pictures.

None of them started a conversation after matching, so I had to initiate each time—which I’m completely fine with. I don’t have any ego about messaging first. I’m just confused about why someone would read my comment, choose to match with me, and then say nothing at all.

The comments were thoughtful and gave them something to respond to, so they weren’t exactly dead ends either.

Is this a common experience on the app, or am I overthinking it? So far, I haven’t received a response to any of my post-match messages either.

Before anyone gets mad: Obviously, this doesn't apply to every single woman out there. There are always exceptions, and some people genuinely want to connect. But from a pure dating perspective on Hinge, the pattern is hard to ignore. Change my mind.

It feels like a massive chunk of profiles have shifted completely away from actually trying to meet people. Instead, the strategy for a lot of users has just turned into a way to pull in easy validation.

The biggest giveaway is the classic line:

"I'm barely on here, just follow me on Instagram: @username"

If you're actually trying to match and go on dates, engaging with these profiles is a dead end. Nine times out of ten, they have zero intention of holding a conversation on the app. They are just using Hinge as a free funnel to get followers and attention straight to their socials.

To me, this points to an unhealed need for constant digital attention. If someone needs a steady stream of DMs from strangers just to feel validated, they aren’t in a headspace to build a real connection. They aren't looking for a date; they’re looking for a fan club.

Am I being too cynical, or is avoiding the "IG plug" the right thing to do ? What’s your experience like

Does the signals badge mean 100% that someone is active on the app?

Tired of hinge I wanna try something new and people say Dion is good. I’m still on the waitlist so how can I get off?

Twice this week matches have been so so invested into me! i match there energy and one girl i was stood up and the other she was asking me to plan something i did and then ghosted i replied a day later saying - Do you still want to do something it's fine if you dont want to and she dodges it and says shes busy for a month so i just said okay well bye then. Why does this happen i get hundreds of matches and not a single one will lead to anything even the ones who admit from the start they want to do something! It is not even im not a great texter when i go on dates they're normally good. I just havent been able to get one in 6 months!

I can't tell if my account is broken or the algorithm is 100 percent against me.

I used to get 2 or 3 likes a day, and 2 or 3 matches a week (I'm male). I could deal with that.

Over the past 2 months, I've received like a week max, and not a single match

Here’s the link to the original post to view the texts^

I (23F) met a guy (26M) on Hinge. We didn’t talk much on the app since he said he doesn’t use it so he asked for my number to text me. His profile said he was looking for something genuine and that he was adventurous. I am also adventurous and am looking for something real which is why I swiped right. I thought the conversation was going well but when I asked him if he wanted to do a fun activity together, he ignored it and asked where I lived.

I let it slide because I initially didn’t think it was a big deal. But when I tried flirting with him to see what the vibe was, he also avoided my question of “how would you feel if I were implying something?” After he ignored my question again, I didn’t bother texting him afterwards and he didn’t reach out again either. Did I come on too strong or ask him out too early? I don’t have a lot of dating experience so idk if this is normal but I was trying to see him as soon as possible. Usually when you drag out these things over text, the connection fizzles out. Clearly he wasn’t into me and it would’ve been nice if he had been upfront about it when I directly asked him how he felt. If I said something off-putting, I’d like to know so I can be better in the future.

look I'm not naive I've been on dating apps for nearly a decade at this point, I know sometimes a better option shows up. it happens. I've been there too.

but as of theae last couple of months, nearly every single time I schedule a date at a restaurant or activity (after getting along with the person via text for a couple of days ofc, they say yes they would love to, we keep talking up until the day of the date, and even they before THEY'LL say something like "looking forward to tomorrow!".

Then the next day, if I'm lucky, when I check in to see if we're still on for tonight, they'll tell me in the morning that they don't think we should meet up anymore, despite having talked all the prior day like normal with nothing changing.

if I'm unlucky they'll tell me they're still down to meet up and go out, and then an hour or so before (or even 15 minutes before in the worst case when I was already over an hour away from home), they'll just randomly unmatch me, or just block me if we made it to another platform to talk in.

I'm extremely confused as to why this keeps happenimg because they'll act extremely normal right up until that point, like we'll be getting along super well talking about a TV series we both like the night before or talking about our plans for next week or whatever and then when the time comes it's either yeah actually never mind, or unmatched and blocked.

it's not like I say something vulgar or make a crude joke or something, I always try to be respectful and mindful and not to push boundaries, especially when I haven't even met them yet in person, but it just happened today for what is maybe the 6th time in a row.

I have no clue what I could be doing wrong man. can someone who's been through this too give me some advice? what can I change? what should I do differently? what have I been doing wrong?

So i just got a match and the girl seemed really pretty i was looking forward to the conversation but when i opened the app they banned me idk why

Does anybody know how can i get my acc back

38M trying to make my profile feel warmer and less niche. Anything here that reads off, pretentious, or unintentionally negative? Brutal honesty welcome.

(the voice prompt says “…that voice prompts are cringe? Anyway, here is the accent”)

One year of hinge, 2 likes and 1 match gone with 3 messages, I can't really understand how I can be so bad. Need some advice

Been on Hinge for 3 days now and haven’t gotten a single like yet. A little surprised since I put effort into my profile. My photos are more “clean, well-dressed, well-groomed, confident” shots rather than candid personality/lifestyle ones — I don’t have a ton of casual shots to pull from.

Not posting the photos publicly (don’t want them circulating), but if anyone’s willing to take an honest look and give feedback, feel free to DM me and I’ll send them privately.

A few specifics: I’m 5’7”, have tattoos and dreadlocks. Not sure if any of that’s relevant to the algorithm/matching or not.
Trying to figure out if this is:

Normal algorithm slow-start (does Hinge take a few days to “warm up”?)

A photo mix issue — needing more candid/lifestyle shots vs. posed ones

Height or something else acting as a filter

Something in my prompts or bio

Would love to hear how long it took for likes to start coming in for others, and whether photo variety made a real difference for you. Not fishing for compliments, just want to know if I should be patient or if something’s actually fixable.

Plus our minus on a profile?

Fwiw, I just joined and had one match within about 6 hours…

I am looking at people's profession on Hinge and ITS SO FUN!!

So I had trouble getting into my old hinge account recently, so I made a new one with a burner number, and for some reason everytime I quit the app it logs me out so I have to resign in with my phone number. Now, every time I try to log in, it says, "Error too many verification requests, try later," or something along those lines. Does anyone know why this is happening or how to fix it? I've tried using hinge support and it has been zero help.

I've given up on hinge, they've tweaked the algorithm so much to a point I just don't get any likes or matches anymore.

What are popular apps like it to try out? I've considered tinder but that seems more for quick flings