Big redesign, introducing a $7/mo charge and this cute criticism of "swiping culture": Some interesting stats in their Medium post. I haven't used a dating app in over a year so I'm curious what singles think of this direction.

I'm thrilled to share that Hinge has ditched swiping to double down on real relationships. Hinge's new app, which launched today, is completely redesigned and rebranded for people who want to escape the games and find something real. It gets rid of the 'swipe' and introduces the 'impression' - which leads to way more conversations and dates. Earlier this year when Hinge's CEO, Justin McLeod, told me of his plans to launch The Relationship App, I thought it was a bold and daring move. Glad to see their launch is off to a great start!

I like how products for dating/meeting people are incorporating stories. Great job guys! We are trying something similar with @pinwheelapp Cheers :)

Will a $7 membership fee and losing the "swipe right for love" model help Hinge become the Match.com for the next generation? On the day that the Atlantic published this long read on @tristanharris's work on how to fight back against apps that effectively addict their mobile users, it's worth considering whether Hinge will start a trend towards deeper, more meaningful experiences accelerated through technology, rather than becoming the destination itself, especially considering their new mission statement: “Inspired by love and guided by authenticity, we create meaningful connections among those bold enough to seek real relationships.”

I really like this change in direction and I'm excited to see where Hinge goes from here. However, in just trying the new app, the inability to easily re-arrange the order of profile pictures is annoying. =X

This is a huge problem! I met my current girlfriend on Tinder, but it's such a gamble, you never know. I went on 6-7 bad dates (and talked to far more people) before I met her. If you are serious about meeting someone who is real and who you might have a connection with, many of the current solutions feel pretty shallow. I might not be a user, but I love what you guys are doing. Keep it up.

@jpmcleod @mrlevy As someone who is driven by making amazing real world connection and working on a startup focused on facilitating more of them, but with finding a place to stay being the "why" (more than one person who's played w/ Horizon has described it as a "hinge approach to couchsurfing/airbnb") -- I love the new product. It is indeed a bold bet, but a great one imho. As a user of many dating apps over the past few years, the core swiping experience absolutely has become tiresome. My biggest frustration with most apps is the signal to noise (or noise to signal) problem. The key is delivering relevant potential matches...and I think your new revenue model will help with that significantly. You've put just enough friction in it to make people evaluate people on more than looks, but not so burdensome to be annoying.

Creative website design. Love it!

Hinge always felt like the most serious "swiping app", so I'm glad to see this bold move. Not many of the other existing dating apps could / would take this bet. I'm curious about the thought behind offering a 3 month trial, given that users who find a relationship are much more likely to disengage compared to tinder and the other apps. Are you worried about people finding their relationships before they start paying?

Props to the team for tackling the bigger mission of real connections. After playing with this for a short while I really commend the bravery and direction you guys are going in, it finally feels like it has it's own soul vs. the competition. I found the visual design refreshing and clearly a lot of good brand work has been done here. Product wise however, I found myself in the same patterns as the swipe based apps. What I found: The profile discovery / matching tech is either still early or suffers the same issue that every other interest based app has; defining taste. It takes a LONG time to get a sense of my profile or preference. The result is I was stuck in the endless "next" cycle trying to find interesting people, experientially I was right back in swipe-world. I assume this tech will get better with time, but, if you're charging for the app my expectation is an order or magnitude higher. Secondly I found the model for interacting with people unclear and complicated… I often found myself at a dead end with profiles not knowing what to do next if I was interested in a person. I like the idea of a person's "story" but it lacked a strong affordance to express a connection. Adding a like or comment to particular photo felt unsatisfying and fragmented. Do I only like that one part of the person? It reminded me or adding a comment on a photo in an album versus the album at large. The main benefit i've found for swiping or liking a profile is that you perform a visceral, definitive act of saying "yes". It's a clear and emotionally resonant feedback mechanism that solidifies my choice. I found it quite hard to say "yes" to people in the new version. Lastly the subscription model… The idea that paying puts everyone on the same page is probably true to some extent but that can't be the only reason, right? I expected you guys to sell your discovery tech or some other benefit but it seemed to the only one. Not sure if this is compelling yet… In the end I've still found OkCupid's Q&A tech by *far* the best match of taste and personality. I'm curious what the Hinge team is betting on to compete with this if they want to play in the recommendations space?

Shout out to Hinge for including interracial and homosexual couples in the animated video! Started rooting for yall after reading Justin's blog post and seeing the whole "anti-swipe" campaign, hopefully this model works out for yall. Not sure how I feel about pairing Tiempos (the serif font) with National (the sans serif font)…imo it works better when you use National for everything, like on your website (excluding the hero image). Think the two are a mismatch, just my two cents.

This is awesome! I have so many friends who have found their significant others (and spouses) on Hinge. If this update leads to even more real relationships as stated, then all the better for lonely hearts!

Thanks Ryan! Last fall Hinge faced a turning point. Even though we were as big as ever and still growing, we knew we were simply not living up to our mission of helping people find relationships. After extensive research and even more soul-searching, we had to concede that in fact our entire model was flawed: swiping seemed to be an addictive game that did more to keep our members single than to help them find relationships. And many, it seemed, were tired of the games. So were we. So we decided to cut bait and embark on what became a nine-month journey to develop an entirely new service which would ditch swiping, matching, timers and games and replace them with a way to help people meaningfully connect. With the release of our new app today, we hope we can pave the way for a new normal in dating culture that treats people with dignity and helps those seeking relationships find what they’re really looking for. Regardless of your previous experience with Hinge and other so-called ‘dating apps,’ I hope that if you’re over the games and ready to find something real, you’ll consider starting a new relationship with us. I’ll be here all day along with our head of product, Sam Levy, responding to any questions you might have.

Would love to know your thoughts on what comes next!