What Are the Best Dating Apps Similar to Bumble for Men?

Hinge, Tinder and OkCupid are the closest alternatives to Bumble. Hinge is the nearest in feel, with a relationship-minded reputation. Tinder is the swipe app with the biggest crowd. OkCupid starts from a compatibility percentage and offers free messaging. Which is best depends on how you write and how often you open the app.

Bumble's core is a People tab where you like people, plus an opening message that both of you get to send once you match. Matches run on a timer, and a match that gets no message before it runs out expires.

It also has a dating intentions filter, which lets you see only people whose intentions match yours. That is the feature men most often miss when they leave.

Keep those three things in mind as you read the rest: the like, the opening message from both sides, and the clock.

Hinge uses prompts, likes and comments. A like lands on a particular photo or prompt, and you can add a comment to it. Hinge also has a Your Turn system, built around the chats that are waiting on you.

a dating coach picks Hinge and rates it far above Bumble, though he frames that as his opinion and says you should use what you like. He also says that in major US cities Hinge tends to do better than Tinder.

Our view is that Hinge suits a man whose photos and written answers give a woman something to point at. A page with nothing on it hands her nothing to like.

Tinder is the swipe app, with Likes and Nopes and Most Compatible recommendations. The decision happens on a single card in a second or two, so clear photos matter more here than anywhere else.

coach points out that in much of Europe, Tinder is almost the only app people use, and that in major US cities it has a lot of fake profiles. So it can be the wrong choice in one place and the obvious one in another.

If you like a fast pace and have strong photos, it is worth a try. If you want a feel closer to Bumble's, Hinge fits better.

OkCupid matches by Match percentage and offers free messaging. A percentage is a different starting point from a like on a photo, because it frames the first look around compatibility.

That makes it the most different from Bumble. It suits a man who would rather write a thoughtful first line than win a swipe in a second, and the free messaging means a conversation does not wait on a payment.

Bumble's dating intentions filter lets you see only people whose intentions match yours. Tinder, Hinge and OkCupid also let you filter by distance and age.

So if intentions are your reason for leaving Bumble, no other app in this list copies that filter. You will need to state what you want on your page and read hers for the same thing.

Our view is this.

If you reply quickly and like a short window, you may do fine on Bumble and Hinge both.

If you check the app a couple of times a week, Bumble's timer is a poor fit for that rhythm, which is a good reason to test another app.

If your photos are your strongest asset, Tinder rewards that fastest.

If you write well, OkCupid and Hinge give your words a place to work.

None of that makes one app better than another. It tells you where to start.

My advice is to test several and keep the one where you succeed. Some men do poorly on one app and well on the next, and he puts that down to differences in each app's algorithm and in who is on it.

Run a short test on two apps at once with the same photos and the same openers, and compare how many conversations and dates each produces. Keep the winner and let the other go quiet.

Each app sells paid tiers. My rule for all of them is to buy one for a short stretch and keep it only if your results move. A tier multiplies what your page already earns, so the page comes first.

Start with Hinge if you want something close to Bumble, use Tinder if it is the app people near you actually use, and try OkCupid if you would rather write than swipe.