Tinder will let U.S. universities access its Tinder U service in the hopes of providing college students with an enhanced dating experience.
To sign up for the service, Tinder requires its users to have a college email address (.edu) from an authorized four-year nonprofit school in the United States that teaches courses in a conventional face-to-face learning scheme. The performance of the Tinder U is relatively the same as the regular Tinder, although the UI interface looks a bit unique.
Brian Norgard, the chief producer for Tinder, said that they decided to unveil the Tinder U service because Tinder is primarily composed of users ages 18 to 24 years old. Pew Research added that dating apps usage, in general, among this age group has increased from 10 percent in 2013 to 27 percent in 2016.
"Today, more than half of our users are between the ages of 18 and 24. With Tinder U, we're excited to honor our roots with a new experience that helps students meet other students nearby. It's a fresh product that will make campus life even more entertaining," Norgard explained in a statement.
Its parent company, Match.com, first revealed the service in its quarterly earnings call a few weeks ago after Tinder accounted for most of the revenue growth of the organization. Statistics showed that there were 3.8 million paying Tinder users in the second quarter of this year against 1.7 million at the same time in 2017.
More Than Just A Dating App
Tinder U will also make use of badges, which will be displayed on the user's main profile image. The badge will indicate the university information of the user. In addition, Tinder U will still let users swipe left and right to match or pass, contact mutual matches, view profiles, and take advantage of Super Likes.
Tinder noted that its new service is more than just a dating app, citing that users can also meet other students as well as study buddies. Tinder U users are likewise given the privilege to swipe by location or by Tinder picks if they are a gold member.
The new service comes after Facebook's interest to enter the dating the world. At present, Tinder has at least 50 million users worldwide and 3.8 million subscribers.
The company said that its new feature will initially be available for iOS devices. However, Tinder did not provide a timetable as to when the app will hit the Android market.
