This article was published more than 6 months ago. Some information may no longer be current. Singles using dating apps feel burnt out, demoralized and ready for something radically unorthodox β taking dating back to the basics. Icebreaker questions ripple through the circle of strangers on a Tuesday evening in downtown Toronto.
The 10 women and eight men clutch cocktails and beers at the pseudo-retro-style Rooftop on College, some laughing nervously as they ask and answer the prompts, others giving off the confidence of a tenured professor presiding over class. The exercise is a kind of social lubricant before the main attraction: speed dating.
Singles will chat in pairs for around eight minutes before moving on to the next person, later marking Yes or No beside each date, and within 48 hours, find out if they have any matches.
Go old school. From Gen Z to seniors, every generation is fed up with online dating. The mind games and ghosting, the rejection, the scammers and players. They feel burnt out, demoralized and ready for something radically unorthodox β taking dating back to the basics. The complaints about that jungle are universal: Basic features on apps that were once free now require pricey subscriptions, the tedium of carrying multiple conversations that never lead to an actual date, the overarching feeling that a better, more attractive match could be just one swipe away.
It all began in with the launch of the first mainstream online-dating site, Match. Then came eHarmony, Plenty of Fish and OkCupid, which all used detailed questionnaires to find compatible matches. When Grindr arrived in , it upended modern dating. Designed specifically for gay men, the app ranked users based on proximity, showing the profiles of the closest men nearby. Three years later, Tinder launched with a similar location-focused approach. It only took a few minutes to set up a free profile, a breeze compared with the surveys required by traditional dating sites, and unlock a seemingly endless supply of nearby singles.
