Latest news with #Grindr
Fast Company
a day ago
- Business
- Fast Company
Bumble is stumbling. Tinder is flagging. But this go-to gay dating app is thriving
Dating app Bumble continues to lose its footing. After subpar earnings, sluggish user growth, and internal stagnation, the company has laid off 30% of its staff. Meanwhile, its dating app competitor Grindr is soaring. Among dating apps, Match Group's properties— mostly Hinge, sometimes Tinder—lead the market. The duo's ubiquity frame apps like Bumble and Grindr as boutique alternatives, designed for their innovative features or specialty user bases. That's a difficult market to occupy, especially as dating app fatigue sets in and Gen Z seems to push for more in-person (and sexless) encounters. Those factors are just part of the reason why Bumble and its competitors are falling behind. But LGBTQ+ hookup app Grindr is flourishing—posting solid growth in both user acquisition and revenue. In May, Grindr CEO George Arison spoke with Fast Company about his efforts to build a broader offering on the foundation of its core location-based grid of users—including some popular new features and a foray into telemedicine. He isn't convinced that generational patterns entirely explain the struggles of dating apps. 'This whole 'Gen Z-avoiding-apps' thing makes no logical sense. Gen Z loves TikTok and loves Reels and thinks you can read something online and you're an expert in it, but they're not gonna do dating online?,' he says. 'What I do think and what makes logical sense, is that if you don't build a product that Gen Zers want, they're not going to use it. That's where I think some of our peers have fallen flat.' His vision is still in progress, but here's how the company's constant efforts to test and scale new ideas could serve as a guide to its competitors. Comparing Bumble and Grindr Bumble and Grindr both went public in the early 2020s, when the dating app market was still hot thanks to the pandemic's digital boom. Since their IPOs, both Bumble and Grindr have hit rough waters—though Grindr managed to right itself while Bumble continues to, well, bumble. Bumble's stock opened at $43 per share—a height it hasn't reached since late 2021. In 2025, Bumble's share price was hovering around $5 in early June, jumping above $6 only at the news of layoffs earlier this week. Meanwhile, Grindr—which debuted at $16.90 in 2022, initially dropped to $5, but has been above $15 since November 2024 and exceeded $20 per share since mid-April. Revenue figures have told a similar story. Founder Whitney Wolfe Herd returned to Bumble in March on the eve of some sour news: Bumble's Q1 earnings showed an 8% decrease in revenue year-over-year. For the same quarter, Grindr's revenue grew 25% over the prior year. Arison told Fast Company he sees the company's performance as a reflection of the contributions that the LGBTQ+ community—he is gay himself—can make to the business world. 'Part of our mission has to be we do super well as a business and we force everybody to change,' he says. Neither app releases consistent and specific user counts. Grindr appears to be growing its user base as Bumble's gains are slow. In its Q1 earnings, Grindr reported 'more than 14.5 million' monthly active users, up from 'more than 13.5 million' the year prior. Bumble's earnings are split by paying users, a focus for former CEO Lidiane Jones. While the company grew its paying app users by 11% in 2024, it has since shed 100,000 of those subscribers in 2025. What should a dating app look like? Under Arison's leadership, Grindr has turned into an innovation powerhouse. In his May interview, Arison emphasized the creation of Albums—bundles of photos sent via chats and not directly displayed on a profile—which debuted in 2022. In 2024, Grindr users sent over two billion albums. He also pointed toward the app's new Right Now feature, which lets users search specifically for more immediate action. In D.C. and Sydney, two of the feature's trial markets, Arison said that '25 to 35% of our weekly active users were regularly going into the Right Now experience at least once a week.' Grindr's new features are available for all users, though paid subscribes receive additional uses. For example, free Grindr users get to post to the Right Now feed three times a week. Down the line, the company plans to make sessions available for purchase. That's part of Arison's strategy: Opening new features with limitations as a bridge to paid customer conversion. 'I don't want Grindr to end up like some of our competitors, who hollowed out their products focusing only on monetization and building nothing,' Arison told Fast Company. 'We are doing product-led processes—it's not just monetize, monetize, monetize. We're saying: Build new things, and those things will lead to revenue.' In contrast, Bumble has moved slowly with their feature rollouts. The 'Opening Moves' feature debuted in 2024, allowing users to list prompts for new matches to respond to. The feature undercut Bumble's initial mission that women should message first. Since then, they've also instituted ID verification and date-sharing safety features. Many of the app's most compelling features—like backtracking left swipes, Travel Mode, and Incognito Mode—are only available to paid users. With dating app fatigue on the rise, both Bumble and Grindr have also expanded into alternate markets. Both have emphasized the role of friendship and platonic encounters on their apps, with Arison promoting Grindr's ongoing effort to become the 'global gayborhood in your pocket,' noting 'Our younger, 18-plus cohort wants to be in an environment where there are older people as well. Friendships between younger and older people are much more common in our community.' Bumble launched its friend-focused Bumble B.F.F. in 2016, and broke it out into a stand-alone app, Bumble for Friends, in 2023. While Bumble for Friends doesn't release stand-alone user numbers, its million-plus Google Play downloads is dwarfed by Bumble's more than 50 million downloads. Grindr's 'gayborhood' model also flows easily with the original app; users have been employing Grindr for non-dating activities since its advent. By spinning their Friends function out into a separate app, Bumble must seek out an entirely separate user base. In this area, Grindr is making a similarly big bet on how it can show up in different ways for its users. The company recently launched Woodwork, a telemedicine company selling erectile dysfunction pills, in Illinois and Pennsylvania. Arison also predicted that Grindr would expand into 'haircare, skincare, and other things of that nature.' 'When I started talking to shareholders, part of the conversation was: What do we want Grindr to be? Just a dating app or something more?' Arison told Fast Company. 'Their view was very strong: We want to be a lot more.'
Bloomberg
a day ago
- Business
- Bloomberg
We Want to be the Gayborhood on Your Phone: Grindr CEO
Grindr, the LGBTQ dating app, has laid out an AI-driven roadmap to fuel growth, with plans for several new features this year. Grindr CEO George Arison says about 35% of current long-term gay relationships in the United States started on the platform. But Arison says the company is expanding beyond dating, and its "strategy is to be the "gayborhood on your phone", offering other experiences and services to users. Arison joined Francine Lacqua on "The Pulse". (Source: Bloomberg)
Sydney Morning Herald
2 days ago
- Sydney Morning Herald
Judge blasts dating app assaults on gay men as ‘horrific example of groupthink'
WARNING: GRAPHIC CONTENT A judge has blasted the actions of three young men who used dating apps like Grindr to lure, violently assault and rob men in Melbourne parks as a horrific example of groupthink. Abdullah Bloch, Albin Idrizi and Madhi Nowruzi, all aged 20, pleaded guilty to charges including kidnapping, armed robbery and assault-related offences at the County Court of Victoria, claiming their actions were a case of 'mistaken vigilantism' against men they suspected to be sex offenders. However, Judge Simon Moglia flatly dismissed the claim saying there was 'no reasonable basis' for them holding that view. 'I find that your offending can only be understood as a horrific example of groupthink and immature, misguided, mutual peer pressure aimed at attacking individual men in vulnerable circumstances in order to make 'easy money',' he said. In May, police said at least 35 arrests had been made around Melbourne for assault, robbery, false imprisonment and even extortion in a new form of homophobic violence in which perpetrators use apps such as TikTok to post and boast about their crimes. At a previous hearing, the court heard disturbing details of the trio's crimes including how they lured men into parks or quiet streets after connecting with them on dating sites including Grindr and Scruff, using fake profiles before brutally assaulting and robbing them. In one incident, a victim aged in his 50s was falsely told that he was meeting a 15-year-old boy after first matching with one of the men who used a fake profile of a 22-year-old man. Graphic video footage of his assault, captured on a smartphone, showed the victim being set upon by the men, who accused him of sexual misconduct and being a paedophile. The man is seen screaming and pleading for his life as he is violently assaulted, choked and then beaten with a metal pole.
The Age
2 days ago
- The Age
Judge blasts dating app assaults on gay men as ‘horrific example of groupthink'
WARNING: GRAPHIC CONTENT A judge has blasted the actions of three young men who used dating apps like Grindr to lure, violently assault and rob men in Melbourne parks as a horrific example of groupthink. Abdullah Bloch, Albin Idrizi and Madhi Nowruzi, all aged 20, pleaded guilty to charges including kidnapping, armed robbery and assault-related offences at the County Court of Victoria, claiming their actions were a case of 'mistaken vigilantism' against men they suspected to be sex offenders. However, Judge Simon Moglia flatly dismissed the claim saying there was 'no reasonable basis' for them holding that view. 'I find that your offending can only be understood as a horrific example of groupthink and immature, misguided, mutual peer pressure aimed at attacking individual men in vulnerable circumstances in order to make 'easy money',' he said. In May, police said at least 35 arrests had been made around Melbourne for assault, robbery, false imprisonment and even extortion in a new form of homophobic violence in which perpetrators use apps such as TikTok to post and boast about their crimes. At a previous hearing, the court heard disturbing details of the trio's crimes including how they lured men into parks or quiet streets after connecting with them on dating sites including Grindr and Scruff, using fake profiles before brutally assaulting and robbing them. In one incident, a victim aged in his 50s was falsely told that he was meeting a 15-year-old boy after first matching with one of the men who used a fake profile of a 22-year-old man. Graphic video footage of his assault, captured on a smartphone, showed the victim being set upon by the men, who accused him of sexual misconduct and being a paedophile. The man is seen screaming and pleading for his life as he is violently assaulted, choked and then beaten with a metal pole.
Miami Herald
3 days ago
- Miami Herald
43-year-old meeting teen for sex acts is attacked and runs for help, FL cops say
A man trying to meet a 15-year-old from a dating app was arrested after he was beat up and asked someone to call the police, Florida authorities said. Jadesadapatch Keawsend, 43, is charged with traveling to meet a minor after using a computer to seduce/solicit/lure a child, according to the Jacksonville Beach Police Department. Keawsend told police that he met a 15-year-old on the Grindr dating app and the two exchanged explicit photos, officers wrote in an arrest report June 17. After learning the teen's age, he said it was OK and asked if he could meet him that night, police said after viewing the messages. Keawsend told officers they agreed to meet at Gonzales Park to 'talk,' but when he got there, the teen told him to get on his knees, according to the report. Keawsend said he was confused, then a group of four males ran at him and jumped him, police said. The 43-year-old said they punched and hit him in the head and neck several times as he fell to the ground, before he got up and ran to a gas station, according to officers. The clerk said an injured man came in and asked her to call the police, telling her he had tried to meet up with a teenager when he was assaulted, police said. He was bleeding from scrapes on his right arm and left knee, according to officers. When police arrived, Keawsand flagged the officer over and explained what happened, allowing police to take photos of his Grindr conversations, according to the report. 'It should be noted when Keawsend was asked if this act was legal in Thailand, Keawsend stated it was not,' police wrote. The man was booked in Duval County jail. Police said they're investigating the assault on Keawsend and his attempt to meet up with the minor.
