What the dating apps can't say out loud

Match Group owns Tinder, Hinge, OkCupid, Plenty of Fish, Match, and a dozen other apps you've heard of. All operate on the same basic model: a free tier that surfaces enough matches to keep you engaged, and a paid tier that sells you tools to win against the algorithm that the same company built. Whether or not that's "designed to keep you single" — a claim the company strongly denies, and which is currently being arbitrated after a 2024 class-action lawsuit raised exactly that argument — the financial reality is that they earn more when you stay than when you leave.

This is why their apps feel the way they feel. The dopamine loop is the product. The frustration is the product. The fact that you can swipe for an hour and end up with nothing is not a bug. The "people who matched with you" you can't see unless you upgrade is not a paywall accident. The fact that someone you matched with three months ago is still sitting in your inbox, never written, is not because the app is being gentle about old matches. It's because every old match is another reminder that you have not yet found anyone — which is, eventually, when you would stop paying.

We are not going to fix this by making a better Hinge. We are going to fix this by making something that is not Hinge.

Love Letter doesn't have a paid tier. There is no boost. There is no see-who-liked-me unlock. The whole product is the same product whether you've been here ten minutes or ten months. There is no path by which the company makes more money the longer you stay single. So there is no reason to engineer features that keep you single.

We will sometimes fail to match the right people. The other apps will sometimes succeed. The difference is whose side we're on while we're trying.