Everything to know about Tea, the viral and controversial app that lets women mark men as red flags

Fast Company

2 days ago

BY
Not too long ago, it used to take trial and error and a girls' night to find out that your date is a walking red flag. Now, there's an app for that.
The Tea Dating Advice app—which allows women to anonymously leave feedback on men—has quickly captured the attention of social media.
Founded and self-funded by former product manager Sean Cook, the app quietly launched in 2023, but it has just recently gained momentum. Beating out ChatGPT, the app this week became the No. 1 most downloaded app on Apple's App Store. It has over 4 million users, the company claims.
Cook first started the company after 'witnessing his mother's terrifying experience with online dating—not only being catfished but unknowingly engaging with men who had criminal records,' the company website reads.
Fast Company reached out to Tea for comment on this article. A press representative declined.
The idea behind Tea is not new. Similarly themed forums have existed for years online. For instance, in the popular 'Are We Dating the Same Guy' Facebook group, women share photos and information about their partners to find out if they were cheating, while also offering support networks to spot red flags.
And while such groups do routinely get taken down due to privacy concerns, apps mimicking the model have also popped up, with one even taking the group's name.
Still, as the Tea app continues to gain traction, it has also garnered criticism and raised concerns about privacy, particularly among male groups.
How does Tea work?
Serving as a sort of 'Yelp for men,' Tea lets women leave feedback on men they have previously dated, marking them as a green or red flag. Marketing itself as an app that revolutionizes safety in dating for women, the app also has a built-in sex-offender map and a chat section for women to discuss advice.
Additionally, a premium paid version of the app offers more advanced safety tools, including an AI -powered reverse image search to spot catfishing, a background check tool, and criminal record and court document searches.
The paid version of the app currently costs $14.99 a month, with 10% of the profits going to the National Domestic Violence Hotline, according to an annual giving statement published on the app's website.
Fast Company reached out to the National Domestic Violence Hotline to confirm, but did not receive a comment at the time of publishing.
To access Tea, women have to verify their gender by submitting a selfie, which is then verified by the app's team.
Once accepted, users can post a photo of their partners, comment on perceived toxic behavior, add design elements like green or red flags, or generally ask the community if they know any 'tea' on them. However, there is no verification process to certify that all claims are truthful.
Fast Company gained access to the Tea app and used some of its features, which were prone to glitches during a review of the UX on Friday. Screenshots of the app are disabled.
Men are not happy about it
While Tea as a concept might seem useful for women in today's complex dating world, men online are alarmed by the app.
In one popular Reddit group, r/MensRights, a megathread about the Tea app was started on July 24, following several posts of men criticizing the app and asking how to get posts about them taken down.
On TikTok, several posts denouncing the app have also gone viral.
'This is a disaster of epic proportions,' one user shared on TikTok. 'You don't even have to prove you went on a date with this person.'
Additionally, claims of a 'male version' of the app circulated on social media, with users claiming that it was quickly taken down due to inappropriate content, although its existence is not yet verified.
It's unclear if Tea's sudden popularity will land it on the radar of Apple or Google, both of which have lengthy guidelines that prohibit apps with harmful or objectionable content on their app stores. Fast Company reached out to Apple and Google for comment.
Growing concerns as user base skyrockets
It's not just men who have expressed concerns or even outright complaints about Tea. 'It's so oversaturated. I was scrolling, and there is a bunch of men with no comments, no anything,' one female user shared on TikTok. 'I feel like that defeats the purpose.'
Concerns over user safety have also circulated, with some worried that women with access to the app might be sharing the posts with their male friends, which could potentially put the anonymous users in harm's way.
Meanwhile, the news website 404 Media recently reported on a data breach in which personal information from Tea users—including drivers' licenses and selfies—were allegedly leaked on 4chan.
Tea acknowledged the breach after the story was published via a post on the app, saying the leaked dataset included 72,000 images, of which 13,000 were selfies and other types of photo identification.
Tea's privacy policy claims that photos are 'securely processed and stored only temporarily and will be deleted immediately following the completion of the verification process.' However, the leaked dataset was from 'over two years ago,' the post says, contradicting the company's own privacy policy.
As Tea continues to spark debates around privacy, toxic dating cultures, and potential ways that the app could be abused, many users across social media are merely highlighting the deeper meaning behind the app itself.
'While everyone's laughing at the stuff posted on that app, I'm honestly disgusted. My heart breaks for every woman who's been cheated on, lied to, mistreated, harassed, or worse,' another user shared on TikTok. 'There is nothing funny about trauma. It's not cute. It's not entertainment.'
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Maria Jose Gutierrez Chavez is the editorial fellow at Inc. and Fast Company. Before joining Mansueto Ventures, she interned at The Boston Globe, El Economista, and The Architect's Newspaper. More