The best dating apps to get you laid
Looking for a last-minute one-night stand? You might think Tinder is your best bet, but new data shows you might actually have better luck elsewhere.
A new study from Luminoso, a company spun off from the MIT Media Lab, has figured out which dating apps are most likely to get you laid, help you find love and more. To do this, they used natural language understanding, a type of AI, to analyze more than 100,000 reviews of 16 of the biggest dating apps.
The results are especially interesting since it can be tricky to assess these kinds of things. People don’t always type “I got laid” in a review, but a data scientist from Luminoso explained in an email that beyond looking for mentions specifically of getting laid, their software can search the concept. That means they can capture lots of relevant phrases and even allusions to get to the heart of what users think about different apps.
AdultFriendFinder — readers’ pick for casual connections
Hinge — popular choice for regular meetups
So, what does this mean for you? Well, if you’re looking for an uncomplicated night of fun try these apps first: Her, CoffeeMeetsBagel, FEM, Happen and OKCupid, in that order. Her and FEM, as their names suggest, are just for lesbians. But for everyone else, CoffeeMeetsBagel is the top option. That’s also where you’ll find the most attractive people, according Luminoso’s data -- what a happy coincidence.
Funnily enough, the app that scored lowest on the “getting laid” scale was Grindr. That was followed by eHarmony, Christian Mingle and Zoosk. Grindr is a shock, since it’s essentially designed for hooking up, but perhaps reviewers just talk about it different. The rest of these rankings, though, make a great deal of sense.
But what if you want something more than just a one night stand? Well, when it comes to finding lasting love you’re essentially looking at the same pool of apps in a different order: Her, FEM, Happn, Scruff, OK Cupid, CoffeeMeetsBagel. As for the worst places to find true romance: eHarmony, Grindr, Christian Mingle and Match. A real blow to the dating establishment.
Reviewers, of course, have lodged plenty of complaints. And Luminoso’s data showed that Zoosk, eHarmony and Match had the highest reports of fake profiles (those created by the company to engage users, not by fraudulent people), and these three apps were also most frequently labeled a “waste of time.” Ouch.
So if you're looking for someone new, it might be time to ditch the old standards and give one of these apps a few swipes.
Cassie Murdoch is Mashable's Culture Editor.. Before coming here, Cassie was Senior Culture Writer at Vocativ. She previously wrote for Jezebel and The Hairpin. Cassie spends most of her time thinking about and consuming cheese in all its glorious forms.
