My Experience With Dating Apps – What You Need To Know

***First thing’s first, let me make something extremely clear: in no way, shape, or form was this any sort of “How to Lose A Guy in 10 Days” situation (although I think we can all agree that it’s an INCREDIBLE movie). I truly believe that there are great guys (and women!) on dating apps, and I have nothing but respect for anyone who uses dating apps. This post is not about specific people — it’s about the difference between the three apps I tried out, in case there are other people out there who are curious about what dating apps entail. My intentions were genuine and pure during this experience.

So let’s get started. This might be the most out of the ordinary post I ever write, but I’m hoping this post will be helpful to any single ladies out there who have ever been interested in the online dating scene. I spent the last two weeks of my life participating in a “fad” I never really had a desire be a part of. I tried not one, not two, but THREE dating apps for two weeks. Yes, you read that correctly. Three apps, two weeks. Let’s backtrack for a moment.

It all began when I was talking with some of my close girlfriends at work. These girls are SO great — they’re beautiful, intelligent, and constantly make me laugh every single day. How they’re single, I’m not sure. One day, we got to talking about dating apps and the success stories of friends and family members who’ve ended up either long-term dating or marrying someone they met on an app. As the conversation went on, I realized I was one of the only people I knew who had never given the dating app thing any effort (aside from a maybe two-month thing when I first moved to Charlotte four years ago when I didn’t know a soul in this city, and it weirded me out so I deleted it).

You see, there are many reasons I steered clear of dating apps for so long. One of the the main reasons is that they intimidated me, and I always hated the thought of “swiping” to find someone you’re interested in. I mean, come on… HOW BIZARRE is that, when you really think about it? Unless they have something clever written in their bio, it’s pretty much all based upon looks. What if someone isn’t photogenic? What if they’re like most guys I know who have, like, two pictures of themselves and they’re all circa 2009? I mean, I don’t know. Maybe I’m just old-fashioned, or behind the times.

Ladies, help me out here and let me know if you can relate: have you ever spotted someone from, let’s say, across the bar and thought they were extremely attractive? Now… have you ever talked to that person, only to realize there was absolutely zero chemistry? And that personalities did not click at all and you actually couldn’t wait to remove yourself from the conversation? Yikes, the worst.

Looks aren’t everything, and I always felt like that’s how dating apps made it seem. You swipe, basically judging the absolute sh*t out of everyone, only to finally come across someone you find to be attractive and then you hope they’re not a complete weirdo. Seems exhausting. I really think personality is so important when it comes to attraction. Sure, good looks are great. But if personalities don’t mesh and if you can’t laugh with one another or talk about common interests, it’s not going to happen.

Another reason I stayed away from dating apps is because I really haven’t been in any hurry to settle down. I know, I know. As a 26 year old female living in the south, you’d think I would want that, and the truth is… I really don’t right now. Sure, it would be nice to have a partner in crime to share my life with, and to have someone who can kill flying roaches when they come out of no where and attack me in my bedroom late at night. But I’ve been independent and living far away from my friends and family for so long that I’ve never really needed anyone other than myself, and I’ve never gone out looking for someone just for the sake of wanting to date. I would rather be alone than with someone I’m not head over heels for.

So… that’s what held me back all this time. But after my conversation at work, a little bit of time went by and it seemed like people were talking about dating apps everywhere I went. I started paying closer attention to all the people who were using them, and all the new couples I was meeting who met on dating apps. So, I decided to give the apps a try. However, I wasn’t sure what app would be best. I had so many questions about the differences between the apps — these days, there are so many! How are you supposed to choose which app to create an account on? And are the same people on all of the different apps? How does that work? I decided to just go hard in the MF paint and download three different apps. If I was going to do this, I was going to do it right. I wanted to give it a fair amount of time (two weeks), and really figure out the difference between the many dating apps out there and figure out what #AppLyfe is all about.

Ladies (and maybe some gents), here are my thoughts.

Tinder

WTF. I was so overwhelmed by this app and I truly couldn’t get rid of it fast enough. I only made it a few days before deleting my account on Tinder because I couldn’t deal. You see, on Tinder, there really aren’t many ways to narrow anything down. So let’s say you have a specific type, or have strict religious views, Tinder doesn’t allow you to narrow your selections down at all (another app does, which I will get to later). Therefore, you pretty much just get slapped in the face with literally every single guy within a 100 mile radius of where you are (which is actually one of the few things you CAN change on this app). I think I set mine to only pull back people within a 5 mile radius and I was still v v overwhelmed.

It was just way too much. There were so many people, and SO MANY CAR SELFIES. Like, So. Many. Close-up car selfies. Up until I downloaded Tinder, I don’t think it ever really occurred to me that guys took selfies in general. Now I know that if they want to take selfies, they go into their cars and apparently have photo shoots in there. I can only imagine what the selfie game looks like on the other end (from women). I also noticed a lot of very serious photos on Tinder (like, looking a bit angry), which also had me wondering what things look like on their end. Are women posting serious photos as well? I wonder what they thought when they came across my profile and saw me looking mighty chipper.

There were also a ton of shirtless mirror photos, and a lot of group pictures where it was a bit difficult to figure out which person’s profile I was actually looking at. So, ladies and gents, if you’re thinking of creating a dating profile, make sure it’s clear which person you are in the photos! Another thing I learned: it goes down in the DMs. Seriously, I’ve never received more DMs on Instagram in my entire life than I received during the few days I had an account on Tinder. By the way, I am not tooting my own horn here. I talked to my coworkers about it and apparently this is a known thing when it comes to Tinder. So, if you want some IG action, Tinder is for you. Personally, I found this to be a bit much, but that’s just me.

You see, I downloaded this app simply because it’s the OG. This app came out during my senior year of college, and at the time, I think it was taken more seriously than it seems to be taken now. I was a little worried about downloading Tinder (given its bad rep) and I don’t think I’ll be downloading it again.

Hinge

I can certainly see, without a doubt, how people meet and develop successful relationships with Hinge. Hinge allows you to really narrow down your selections, unlike Tinder. I will say, Tinder does keep you from being closed-minded, which is sometimes a good thing. I think it’s always good to stay open-minded and not too into the idea of having a “type”. But what I really love about Hinge is the ability to narrow down selections based on things that are more important than looks — such as, do you drink, and do you want someone else who drinks? Do you smoke? Do you do drugs? Do you want kids? Is it a deal-breaker if the other person doesn’t have these things in common with you? Is religion important?

So, you see, clearly there seems to be more depth to this app right off the bat. In addition to the “narrowing down”, Hinge requires every user to answer three questions to have on their profile. There are tons of questions to choose from, and the idea is for other people to get to know you better and to showcase your personality. I laughed out loud at some of the witty answers I read, which made me feel like I could get a better idea of someone’s personality and not just judge them based on the photos they selected. For example, one of the questions said, “You should swipe right if…” and one guy wrote “you want to go get mozzarella sticks” and I probably should have married him. Hinge was the app I felt most comfortable on, and I really do understand how two people could get to know one another by using this app.

Bumble

Again, I can definitely see how relationships could develop from this app. This also seems to be the latest “trend” when it comes to apps, which is understandable. The only difference between Bumble and other apps, however, is that women have to talk first and “make the first move” on this app. This can either be nerve wracking or empowering, depending on how you look at it. Personally, I kind of liked this, because in my opinion there is nothing wrong with a simple greeting, rather than a pick-up line or joke that may come through when a guy makes the first move on the other apps.

I do wish Bumble had a few more options to weed out some deal-breakers (like on Hinge). I felt like I ran into a similar issue I had with Tinder, where the only major way to narrow down the crowd was to change the distance/miles you want to meet people in. What if I were to come across an attractive guy, only to realize after a few dates that he’s a smoker (which is a deal-breaker for me)? Bumble doesn’t allow you to weed those people out right off the bat, and I wish it did.

I do get the vibe that the type of people on Bumble are a bit different than on Tinder. It seemed like people on Bumble may be wanting to get a bit more serious when it comes to relationships rather than just being on an app to kill time and swipe around, but maybe that just has to do with the current reputation these apps have.

In the end, I decided the App Life isn’t for me, and deleted all of my dating profiles. While I do still feel the same way I felt before I downloaded the apps, my opinion of them has certainly changed for the better.

Ladies, to wrap things up, here’s what you should know: there are most definitely some awesome, handsome, incredible men that are worth meeting on these apps. I think it’s worth downloading at least one app to give it a try. Everyone is different, and the apps may be for you. You’ll never know unless you see for yourself. What’s the worst thing that could happen?

I hope this was even remotely helpful to at least ONE person. If even one person reads this, that’s good enough for me. If anyone has any additional questions about dating apps, please shoot me a message. Also, if anyone has any experiences from dating apps you want to share (good or bad), please leave me a comment to share what happened! I would absolutely love to hear from you.

Hope everyone has a great week.

xo, Ashlen