Hinge Dating App Review :: It’s Not Quite Tinder
Everyone is talking about Tinder these days. It was the forerunner of the free mobile-only dating apps, so it makes sense that it would be the most talked about. But the dating app we hear our Christian friends talking about the most is Hinge. Not because they find it to be significantly superior, but because they feel slightly more at ease with it than they do Tinder.
Hinge Review :: What Can You Expect?
Like Tinder, Hinge is connected to your Facebook account. Where Tinder is primarily about proximity, Hinge is all about Facebook connections. The people you’re matched with on Hinge are second or third degree connections via your Facebook friends. Tinder, on the other hand, lets you know if a match has Facebook connections in common with you, but they also show you anyone who is on Tinder and is within the geographical distance you have set up for matches.
Hinge pulls information from your Facebook account and sets up your basic profile—your name, age, city, where you work, and how many friends you have on Hinge. This information shows up on everyone’s profile; it is not something you can edit, even if it’s set to private in your actual Facebook settings.
When you are matched with someone who is within the distance parameters you’ve set, Hinge lets you know how you’re connected to them—through a Facebook friend, through that friend’s network, or through an extended network of people.
There are some parts of your profile you can manipulate, though. You can fill in a paragraph “About Me” section, share your height, and check a box for your religious preference and ethnicity. They also include some short answer questions for you to complete, like the 3 emojis that best describe you or your favorite drink or my happy place. They’re all meant to be conversation starters. You’re also able to let matches know if you’re open to a relationship, something casual, or just dating.
Hinge also gives you the opportunity to share a little more of your personality by tagging some areas of interest. You can declare yourself a wine snob, world traveler, early bird, night owl, card shark, musician, writer, history buff, sports fan, zombie survivalist, health nut, secret agent, etc. Most of them don’t give you very much detail about a match, but they can show a little more about their humor or interests.
As is the case with most mobile-only dating apps, that’s all it takes to set up a profile. The process is super simple and can be completed in less than 5 minutes. Hinge will immediately begin sending you matches.
Unlike traditional online dating, on Hinge you can’t see a list of matches, click on them one at a time, and then mull it over and decide if you’d like to talk to them. You are given one match at a time and you must decide if you want to express interest (swiping yes or heart-ing one of their photos) or dismiss them and never see them again (touch the X at the bottom of their profile).
If you express interest and it’s not reciprocated, your match will never know. But if you heart their profile and they heart your profile, Hinge lets both of you know that you’re interested in each other and you have 24 hours to start up a conversation or the match disappears. Once you start chatting, you have 14 days to get comfortable enough with that match to exchange phone numbers and then the match—you guessed it—disappears. Evidently, Hinge found these time limits encourage users to make more meaningful connections instead of never acting on them.
Hinge App Review :: How Difficult Is It to Find Other Christians?
Even when you mark that you’re a Christian, you have no way of controlling the settings to only receive Christian matches. So you have to look at each match and show interest in (heart) or dismiss them (X).
So why are the single Christians we’ve talked to liking Hinge better? This is purely anecdotal, of course, but the reason is because they can tell a lot from the person (or people) they have in common on Facebook.
To break it down, here’s an example of how things might work:
Let’s say you were matched with Jamie. (Jamie the Girl, if you’re a guy; Jamie the Guy, if you’re a girl.) You’ll see Jamie’s first name and last initial, the city Jamie lives in, and where Jamie works. You’ll also see Jamie’s Facebook profile pictures, as well as how many friends Jamie has on Hinge. Then you’ll see if you’re connected to Jamie through a Facebook friend, their network of friends, or an extended network of friends. All of those details are things that are pulled through Jamie’s Facebook profile.
You note that Jamie checked the box for Christian. And, since the person you have in common with Jamie is your old youth minister, then you think Jamie might be someone you want to know more about so you strike up a conversation with ol’ Jamie. At the very least, you know Jamie is going to mind their manners because you have people in common.
Jamie could’ve known your youth minister back when Jamie was still professing to know Christ, and if you’re so inclined, before you ever heart Jamie’s profile, you can reach out to your old youth minister and learn that Jamie hasn’t graced the doors of the church since Y2K. Having personal connections helps you to find out that info before wasting too much time chatting Jamie up.
It’s not a perfect system, of course. Sometimes your connections are through your extended network so you don’t really know who exactly you have in common. However, when you do know the connection, it helps you to do further research and make a judgment call before moving forward.
It’s also an imperfect system because communication on dating apps can be flaky. No one has any financial skin in the game, so they can quit anytime they feel like it and pick it back up when they’re in the mood for love or dinner (or…yeah, that too). That’s also a problem with traditional online dating, but at least in that medium people have a limited subscription they’ve purchased so they’re more likely to maximize the time period they’ve paid for. You and Jamie may heart each other on the app but Jamie never actually responds to your effort to communicate in the 24-hour window. Sayonara, Jamie.
Hinge Dating App :: Hinge Is Kinda the eharmony of Apps
When we say, “Hinge Is the eharmony of apps,” we don’t mean they make you take the lengthy eharmony assessment but it does cost the most, and like eharmony, you don’t get an unlimited number of daily matches. While most apps are completely free, Hinge is free for the first 3 months. After that, everyone transitions to a basic free membership, which limits you to 10 people per day. If you want unlimited daily matches, you’ll need to upgrade to premium (around $7/mo).
Hinge aims to attract a more professional, college-educated crowd between the ages of 23-36. If you spend some time on Tinder, you’ll realize that quantity does not equal quality. Sure the matches are never ending and you can get more depending on where you are in the city at the time. But at what point does it all just become too much? Especially when most don’t give you any information besides a name and a few pictures? Hinge can possibly save you a little more time by curating your matches based on Facebook connections, and (bonus!) it keeps your index finger from cramping up.
Hinge Dating App Review :: Bottom Line
When compared to Tinder, it’s an easy choice—Hinge wins. But for Christian singles, when compared to traditional online dating sites, Hinge is lacking. There is no option for narrowing down matches to only those who call themselves “Christian.” So you’re left to sort through all matches that the system gives you each day.
And then if they have checked the “Christian” box, beyond Facebook connections—which aren’t always direct connections that you can trace—there isn’t much else to help you gauge a match’s relationship with Christ besides actually talking to the person. Having a full online dating profile is more helpful to make some early assessments before having to jump into an actual conversation. Talking to people you’re interested in is hard enough; chitchat to discover if the person even goes to church is even more awkward.
Since we haven’t heard from any Christian singles who are finding marriage on dating apps like Hinge, we’d stick with traditional online dating at this point. Or if you’re in a rut and you want to shake things up, we’d pair Hinge with a traditional online dating site like eharmony.
Keep the old and the new, you know?
Current Online Dating Deals:
Last Updated: 5/21/2024
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