Annoyed singles are creating their own dating apps

Dating morale is at an all-time low. Apps have long since fallen out of favor, but the real-world dating scene is also a minefield. We’re at the end of what some consider a failed experiment. It seems like more people than ever are looking for love but not finding anyone to share it with. With 47% of Americans saying dating is harder now than it was 10 years ago, a small new wave of discouraged daters have decided to forge their own path, embracing the age-old adage: If you want something done right, you might have to do it yourself.

“I was so sick of everything,” says Emma Joelle Johnson, a 25-year-old from Vancouver who went viral on TikTok in February thanks to Flirt With Emma, ​​a new dating app with only one option: her.

She took over from Carlos Mayers, a 20-year-old New York City iOS engineer who created the app for himself in 2023. Although he didn’t meet anyone on it, he offered to give it to Johnson a week later. Instead of throwing your profile into an algorithmic melting pot, flirtations are public, subject to the judgment of not just the suitor but everyone else. “You can upvote flirtations that you think should be rizzed better, to move them up,” Johnson explains.

Flirt With is part of a recent trend of more creative, informal attempts at online dating. These DIY developers aren’t looking to launch another Tinder or get rich. They’re just looking to find love in a world they say these apps have ruined. “(They’ve become) almost transactional,” Johnson says.

Many singles agree. The millennial generation that normalized dating apps is, after a decade, tired of swiping for something they suspect the increasingly monetized and algorithm-driven apps will never give them. Meanwhile, meeting people offline has become more daunting. “There’s been a big shift toward idea “When it comes to meeting people in real life, the reality is… questionable,” says Layla*, a 31-year-old from Toronto.

So Molly*, a 30-year-old from London, decided she had nothing to lose by posting a personal ad in Angel Food, an online literary magazine that has a page dedicated to “Earthly Connections.” Another single man, a 33-year-old software engineer named Michael*, made headlines after using Facebook ad space to advertise his own desire for connection. “I’m nice, happy, curious, creative, and a huge nerd,” he wrote. “Basically, I’m looking for a woman who’s open to a serious relationship and lives within a New York City subway line.”

“The conversations were immediately deeper and less awkward than app dating, and it felt a lot more human,” Molly says of the response to her own ad. While it only led to one date and the chemistry wasn’t “amazing,” she’d definitely do it again.

These DIY developers aren’t looking to launch another Tinder or get rich. They’re just looking to find love in a world they say these apps have ruined.

While experienced coders can cobble together an app, those without the skills can turn to something simpler: Google Docs. Known as “dating docs,” the trend gained popularity in 2022 as a more expansive way for singles to advertise themselves outside the whims of Hinge and Bumble’s algorithms.

Anna Koenig, a 37-year-old from Sonoma County, created her “date-me” document in April, describing herself as a “confident, adventurous, fitness- and health-focused, fun-loving woman” looking for “intelligent, communicative, well-mannered company.” The five-page document includes photos, her social media handle and a Google form to get in touch. “Even if it doesn’t lead to finding someone, it (was) a good exercise to get clear about who I am and what I’m looking for,” she says.

Much like people are known for promoting their Soundcloud, Koenig debuted her documentary on X after going viral with a tweet about women’s limited time to have children. She received over 40 responses from around the world. It ended with one phone date, but they ultimately didn’t see eye to eye.

17% of Date-Me users enter into a relationship within a year, compared to 21% of dating app users.

She still keeps the document handy to send to couples on dating apps for additional information. Then she plans to ask her friends to circulate it in their circles—similar to biodata in South Asian cultures, documents that contain physical and biographical information in hopes of arranging marriages. “I’ve heard that the best way to meet someone is through other people you already know,” she says.

Turns out, there’s an app for that, too—if you know where to look. “My friend was telling me all these horrible dating stories on Hinge,” says Christine*, a 30-year-old in Los Angeles, who asked that the name of her app be withheld to protect the privacy of its users. “I thought, you know what, I’m going to make an app just for you.”

A product designer herself, Christine does the exact opposite of what users expect—and dislike—from more traditional options. For example, there’s no swiping, just a directory of profiles, and you can only send one message before you have to move the conversation outside the app. That message is made up entirely of users in Christine’s network and other friends of friends. Many of them already know each other on X, and the app simply helps grease the wheels. The app also lets users “vouch” for others, adding another layer of trust. That’s led to a lot of connections, Christine says, and at least four or five relationships.

These DIY attempts are exciting and innovative, but they can struggle to gain traction. So Steve Krouse, a 30-year-old Brooklyn-based programmer, used the platform to compile hundreds of date-me documents into a directory that can be filtered by sexual orientation, age range and location.

So far, their success is about on par with dating apps — 17% of users find relationships within a year, up from 21%, according to a 2023 study by Krouse Database. Nearly three-quarters of survey respondents have received at least one message, 39% have been on at least one date, and at least one marriage.

“If you say what you think you want, you’ll probably find it,” Krouse says. In that sense, date-me documents are the ultimate form of manifestation, investing significant effort—several paragraphs, even pages—in explaining who you are and what you’re looking for before putting it out into the universe.

“It gives it back its lightness. You don’t feel like you’re scraping the bottom of the barrel anymore,” Johnson says.

The appeal of these burgeoning DIY alternatives goes beyond their novelty and success rate. They’ve also achieved something people started to think was impossible: They’ve made dating fun again. “It was refreshing,” says Calvin*, 29, who sent the app to the “date-me” doc in 2020. He never got a response, but “it was nice compared to the same song and dance of swiping and hoping.”

“It brings back some levity. You don’t feel like you’re scraping the bottom of the barrel anymore,” says Johnson, the face of Flirt With. “At least if it doesn’t lead to my husband, it leads to something fun.”

For her, one response from a local stood out. “He was in the same industry as me, he was already following me, and I had a few of his posts saved,” she says. They met that afternoon and are still together four months later. Now, a new successor has taken over the app. Madison is now accepting flirts and ready to find love — all by herself.

*Requested not to disclose last name.