Dating apps are ditching ‘the swipe’ for meet-ups IRL

By Justine Noble

London (CNN) — Rob Perez only has one dealbreaker when it comes to dating – his partner needs to be a gym rat like him.

“It doesn’t have to be the same sport, but… I think lifestyle-wise, (she has) to understand: I work out, you work out, we do our thing,” he tells CNN.

So when the 33-year-old content creator first heard about Surf – a dating app allowing users to filter matches based on their fitness habits – he was immediately intrigued. As an avid runner, he thoroughly enjoyed knowing that everyone on his screen might be up for joining him. No more “I have to figure out if they like this, and I have to figure out if they like this… It’s all listed right there, makes it pretty easy,” he says.

Surf is one of several dating apps eschewing endless swiping and encouraging potential matches to meet up in the real-world and share experiences together.

This comes as older, more established dating apps like Tinder are reckoning with a decline in paid subscribers. In August, Tinder’s parent company Match Group reported a 6% year-on-year drop in customers paying for its apps to 13.3 million across its portfolio, which includes Hinge, Match and OkCupid. Bumble, in the same month, saw its paid user base fall by 16.4% to 3.2 million, down from 3.8 million the previous year.

About 15 years ago, Tinder revolutionized the way we seek romance in the digital age. But as 78% of app users report burnout across the board and in-person dating events surge, the role of tech in our love lives is changing once again.

When a user downloads Surf, they’re presented with a scrollable grid of about 30 profiles and they don’t need to swipe left or right to move between them. Users can flag their passions and match with others based on theirs.

While founder and CEO Rob Long says users can bond over anything from pickleball to rosé, the app is best known for its partnership with Hyrox - an indoor fitness event combining running and other workout competitions. Users can see when others are in town to compete. This year, they were able to sign up for mixed doubles blind dates in a handful of global cities, from Sydney to NYC.

Still, Surf is a minnow in the dating app market. Surf had only roughly 28,800 downloads worldwide in 2026, with monthly active users too low to track, according to a research firm Sensor Tower. However, it is growing quickly.

Perez was exhausted by repetitive dating profiles and wanted more information on potential matches.

“At one point, I know a lot of people were on Bumble, Tinder, and Hinge. They used all the same pictures, they used all the same prompts. It’s a rinse and repeat thing,” he says.

Perez is now in a committed, exclusive relationship with Grace, his mixed doubles partner from Surf’s Hyrox blind date in Ottawa. After finding someone who values exercise as much as he does, he wishes there were more apps directly arranging first dates.

An app from the Netherlands is doing just this. Breeze, founded in 2020 by a group of university students, doesn’t allow users to chat at all. Instead, the app gives them a time and a place to meet in one of its partner bars.

To avoid swipe fatigue, users get about seven profiles a day to choose from. Now, the app is organizing group dates for between 6 and 10 singles who can be selected based on shared interests.

“The hardest part of dating isn’t meeting people, it’s the pressure we’ve attached to it,” Breeze co-founder Marco van der Woude said in a statement. “A table of eight is a night out first and a date second. Worst case you have a fun evening, and best case you meet the love of your life.”

‘There’s only so much you can do online’

Even legacy dating apps are transforming. On Feeld, a dating app catering to ethical non-monogamy, polyamory and kink, users can sign up to do their hobbies as well as talk about them.

Where London has seen the app’s users bond over nostalgic arcade games, Los Angeles has seen them connect through bouldering, chess and hiking. The app has an events page, where it advertises group meet-ups from comedy nights to clubbing.

“There’s only so much you can do online,” Abigail Gaskin, Feeld’s Director of Brand Marketing, told CNN. “Dating apps are there for the initial connection, and then everything else should be about being in person, a meeting.”

Pointing to a “quiet disillusionment” with repetitive and transactional chat features, she says people are craving low-pressure physical spaces where they can meet people and explore common interests.

To Gaskin, the abundance of tech everywhere doesn’t help: “As we’ve become increasingly online as a society, there is that need for, I suppose, a little bit of friction - having to get up and get dressed and make your way somewhere and meet people.”

Every dating app, new and old, will have to keep up. Major player Bumble is trading its classic swipe to launch a feature setting up in-real-life dates. Tinder is launching an events page on its app.

“Nowadays people are much more discerning about how they spend their time and how they connect,” Gaskin said. “And it’s not just about swiping on a picture and liking it.”

The-CNN-Wire
™ & © 2026 Cable News Network, Inc., a Warner Bros. Discovery Company. All rights reserved.