Which Dating App Is Best for Your Age Group?

None of the apps publishes how many members it has at each age, so nobody can honestly name a winner for your decade. What you can do is match each app's stated purpose to what you want, then test two for a few weeks and keep the one where women answer. Hinge, Bumble and Tinder suit most men at most ages. The differences are in how your age interacts with the way each one sorts people.

Choosing by age sounds logical, and it falls apart quickly. A man of 28 who wants a wife and a man of 28 who wants a good month need different apps, even though they are the same age.

So start with what you want. Hinge says it is designed to be deleted, which points to people who want a relationship. Bumble says it wants members to find meaningful and authentic relationships. Tinder describes itself as a place to meet people. a dating coach says Tinder has a hookup reputation, while Hinge and Bumble lean toward relationships, and that in US cities Hinge tends to do better than Tinder.

Those are the starting points. Your age only changes the details.

At this age you are the person the filters favor. A woman near your age sets a range that is likely to include you, so you reach her feed without effort.

All three big apps are open to every adult age, and happn suits a man who moves around a campus or a city. Your advantage here is also a trap. Because reaching women is easy, many men this age use poor photos and a thin page and blame the app. A clear, recent photo of your face in daylight and a short line that sounds like you do more than switching apps.

a dating coach says dating changes less after 30 than men fear, but it changes in one clear way: you are no longer surrounded by single women by default. At 35, most friends are paired off and the office is not a meeting place, so an app does real work for you.

It is also where the age filter starts to matter. On swipe apps, women set an age range. A woman whose upper limit sits below your age never sees you, however well you would get on. a dating coach's answer for this is to also try a site where you search and message on your own initiative, such as Match, instead of leaving the sorting to the app.

Hinge and Bumble are still a reasonable start. Add a search-based site as your second test.

The same filter problem grows. There are more women whose range stops below you, so fewer swipe-app feeds contain your face.

Two things help. First, say what you want plainly. eHarmony describes itself as a site for people who want a meaningful relationship and asks you at sign-up whether you want casual, serious or not sure. If you know you want something serious, an app built on that question saves you from sorting through people who want something else.

Second, check your own age range. A ceiling set above your own age keeps in your pool the women whose ranges already reach you.

SilverSingles describes itself as a dating site for singles over 50, built for that stage of life, with verified profiles. A man in his forties is not who it says it is for. A man over 50 can add it to the two or three apps he tests.

The mainstream apps remain open to you. They are worth testing for the same reason as everywhere else: the only way to learn who is on them near you is to look. Match, with its search tools and Top Picks, suits a man who knows his priorities and wants to choose rather than be sorted.

Every app asks the same two things of every man: photos that look like you now, and a few lines that only you could have written. a dating coach's biggest point on choosing an app is not about the app. It is about how you write your profile. A page written like a man after a hookup gets hookups. A page that says you want something long term gets that.

He also says you do not have to be loyal to one app. If one is good but small, max it out and move to another. It is fine to be on two at the same time.

Pick two apps that fit what you want. Give both the same photos and the same written lines. Use them every day for two weeks.

Count three things: conversations started, conversations that reached a plan, and dates. The app that gives you more of the third for the same effort is your app, whatever your age says it should be. Then drop the other and spend the freed evenings on messages that ask her out within a handful of texts.