Hinge, one of Match Group’s star dating apps, is launching a new subscription tier and rebranding its existing subscription offering on Thursday in an effort to bring in more paying users to the platform.
Hinge Preferred is being refreshed to Hinge+ and gaining new features. The updated tier also comes with a lower price point, going from $34.99 per month to $29.99—an indication the company is looking to court price-conscious consumers.
Hinge already offers premium benefits like advanced match filters (such as a person’s political affiliations and smoking habits) and the ability to send an unlimited number of “likes” to potential matches per day.
But now, Hinge will make it easier for users to browse who it thinks will be the most responsive and most interested in going out. The company points to people who are nearby, new to Hinge, most likely compatible, and have been active in that same day as examples. Hinge is also making it easier to explore potential matches by sorting incoming likes based on the most recent ones, who is nearby, the subscriber’s type, and who was most recently active.
The efforts could help propel Hinge even higher in Match Group’s stratosphere. The company and its founder, Justin McLeod, have been heavily praised by Match CEO Bernard Kim for its explosive growth. “Hinge is on fire,” Kim and CFO Gary Swidler wrote in a joint shareholder letter last month recapping its fourth quarter of 2022.
The newest offering, HingeX, is a play on the company’s slogan, “Designed to Be Deleted.” It will mark its most expensive monthly offering to date, coming in at $49.99 per month, targeting premium users. Subscribers who pay for HingeX will have their profiles constantly boosted so that they are seen sooner by other singles. Subscribers’ “likes,” or when they indicate interest in another user, will also be shown upfront. They’ll also get “enhanced recommendations” of people the app thinks the subscriber will be interested in, as well as all of the benefits of Hinge+.
“It truly creates a next-level dating experience for anyone looking for a relationship,” McLeod said in a statement. Match Group said in a call with investors earlier this month it expects Hinge to deliver first-quarter year-over-year direct revenue growth of more than 25%, partly thanks to the two new pricing tiers.
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