The main purpose of using a modern dating site or app is to find a soulmate, meet in person as soon as possible, and start a relationship. That’s a generalization of course. But if we proceed from this logic, then during the coronavirus pandemic interest in dating services should have dropped to zero. Yet on the contrary, it grew substantially.
Why did this happen? Why did online dating services generate so much interest amid the pandemic and quarantine? And what are the goals of those people who meet during such a difficult time? Let’s figure it out!
Some interesting statistics
The most difficult period for online dating was 2020, when Covid-19 peaked in many countries. There was no effective vaccine yet, and billions of people were terribly afraid for their health.
At that time, Internet surveys gave us a lot of conflicting data:
- 50% of respondents said that they do not plan to meet people from the Internet offline in the near future.
- 30% said they would meet new acquaintances only after the end of the pandemic. And its ending is still not confirmed.
- 5% admitted that they do not want to make new acquaintances at all until the virus is completely gone.
It would seem that interest in online dating should have declined. But the opposite happened. Even in during a challenging 2020, installs of Tinder, Badoo, Bumble, Happn and Plenty of Fish grew by 4%. And user spending on dating apps increased by 15%. Lexi Sidov, Head of Marketing Research at App Annie, spoke about this. Also in many countries, the number of messages sent in dating applications increased markedly. In the USA by 10-15%, and in Italy and Spain, by 25%.
During the pandemic, the approach to online dating and dating sites themselves changed
Until the beginning of 2020, applications like Tinder developed and introduced new functionality very slowly. The format worked well, brought decent money to the owners of the dating business, and there was no particular need to change anything. But with the onset of the pandemic, everything changed.
People began to use dating sites more and more extensively, as a result of which competition grew rapidly. That is why dating sites had to offer their users something novel in order to attract a new audience and retain the existing one.
Among the most notable updates we can identify the following:
- The appearance of vaccination status of users and bonuses for those who have been vaccinated against the coronavirus.
- Adding video chat functionality to most popular dating platforms.
- Expanding functionality for online dates.
If earlier online dating was aimed at quickly transferring communication offline, then with the advent of the pandemic, this transition slowed down. Now no one is in a hurry. Online dating has become more measured and thoughtful, and Internet users began to take a more serious approach to choosing a potential partner. Now they study other people’s profiles more closely, trying to understand the person as well as possible, find common interests and be sure whether it is really possible to make plans for the future with this person, and intertwine their fates.
The video chat function in particular attracted the attention of the dating audience. And this is connected not only with the desire to know the other user better. The fact is that in quarantine, millions of people began to experience a severe shortage of live communication. People found themselves in a “bubble” of their closest friends and family, and it turned out to be not so easy to go beyond those boundaries. And text chats on dating services cannot replace live communication. Video dates also don’t replace it 100%, but they are as close as possible to it.
The big disadvantage of classic dating sites was that you had to pay to use new features. Many services before Covid were just machines for extorting money. And over time, the situation only worsened. Therefore it’s not surprising that users began to look for an alternative. Fortunately, one was found quickly enough.
Online video chat: video dates without extra costs and wasted time
The history of video chat, or chat roulettes, dates back to 2009, when the world first saw the sites Omegle and Chatroulette. Even then, the format of random dating via video link aroused great interest from the audience. So much so that in just a couple of months of existence, Omegle and Chatroulette gathered a multi-million audience.
Unfortunately, over time, poor moderation, and an abundance of Internet trolls and exhibitionists greatly spoiled the experience on those sites. But there are many alternative video chats. Their developers took the best ideas from Omegle, improved them and offered the audience completely new platforms for communication. The golden age of video chats has come!
During 2010-2020, the online video chat format experienced numerous ups and downs. But it was the coronavirus pandemic that ultimately became the strongest impetus for their current popularity. Millions of people, hungry for communication but disillusioned with the classic dating sites, have switched to video chat.
We can name several leaders among online video chats: Chatrandom, Chathub, Omegle and coomeet.com/omegle. And if Omegle remains a rather conservative chatroulette with a minimal set of functions, then its rivals look much more interesting. For example, Chatrandom has themed chat rooms for many participants, Chathub offers language and gender filters, and CooMeet works exclusively with verified user profiles and can only connect men with girls. And most importantly, the algorithm never makes mistakes. Ideal for lovers of video dating!
Will video chat remain popular after the pandemic?
We can name at least five reasons why video chats like Omegle will stay in demand:
- Video chat takes the best aspect of the online dating format — video communication. People seem to like video dating very much.
- Video chat conveys the spirit of the time — dating takes place quickly and without unnecessary extra actions.
- Dating in video chats does not force or oblige you to anything. Meet and chat with whoever you want and how you want.
- Online video chats are either completely free or, like CooMeet, offer free access to all new members.
- Bloggers and celebrities often appear in web chats, which further spurs interest in them from ordinary users.
There’s no doubt that when everyone forgets about the coronavirus, online video chat will remain a super-popular format!
Internet dating has found a new level
It’s hard to find anything positive in the Covid-19 pandemic. But there are still good points if you look hard enough. Internet dating has reached a qualitatively new level. These sites and apps have already helped millions of people cope with loneliness, expand their social circle and find new friends. And some even found their true love and started a family during this time.
We will continue to monitor the web dating industry and share the most interesting observations with you. And we have no doubt that there are still a lot of interesting things ahead of us!
