Gone are the days when love used to happen at the first sight. Now, dating apps like Tinder are gaining popularity to fill this gap by letting you find the person of your choice. Now love is just a tap away or more like a swipe away.
While apps like Tinder give its users the chance to fall in love, it puts the parent companies on a direct route to profit and escalated growth rates. In this article, we will be looking into Tinder-like app development in greater detail with the aim to give businesses an idea of how much it would cost them to develop a dating app like Tinder.
Tinder is a social dating app that allows people to find a match for themselves and then fix a date with the match with the help of a chatting feature incorporated in the app. Logging in to Tinder requires a Facebook ID so that the location and interests can be used to find the perfect match.
Even though Tinder was in many ways the Flagship brand of the mobility dating world, a number of apps soon followed the trend that the brand created.
Market leaders in the Dating App Category
- Bumble dating app is one such app that is trying to give Tinder serious competition. What Bumble does better is that it provides an immediate chatting option to users, unlike Tinder where you have to wait for weeks to chat.
- Happn is a huge competitor of Tinder giving incredible features like finding and connecting with someone who has crossed your path. The app uses GPS to track every move.
- Raya is for the elite. The dating app development is done in a way that users are ‘accepted’ in the circle based on their social media strength and other factors.
- Hinge works on the basis of connections and lets users find a match that is either a friend or a friend of a friend.
While there are many more in the market but the two biggest competitors of Tinder are Happn and Bumble dating app.
Despite the competition, the application receives one billion swipes per day. There are a number of reasons behind this happening and the most prime one is the feature set that Tinder comes with.
The feature set that Tinder comes up is soon becoming the standard that all the dating app development companies are following
- The ‘swipe’ feature is great to indicate interest in a profile.
- Tinder also allows Instagram integration making it easy to find someone’s Instagram profile.
- Allows chatting with a match and fixing a date.
- Tinder has special plans like Tinder Gold and Tinder plus for users who are willing to pay extra to add on some features.
- Tinder uses geolocation which is quite different from any dating app development.
Now that we have looked into the various features that come as part and parcel of Tinder and other social media app development costs, let us now into the one feature that drives the complete revenue of apps that function as Tinder – Potential Matches.
After learning how does Tinder work, you must be curious to know how does Tinder find the perfect match for users. This is something many users think of when they get a match. Most of the matches do have common interests, location and age group. Let us look at the ways that Tinder dating app show potential matches:
How do apps like Tinder show potential matches?
1. The attractiveness of a user
On the basis of the matches that any profile gets, its attractiveness increases. The more matches a profile gets, the more attractiveness. And they are listed the first to the other users when the app is opened.
2. Activeness of an account
When an account is new, matches a shown to it on the basis of most famous or attractive profiles. This is done to get them started by swiping right on the interesting profiles. This gives the mobile app a direction to sway their users in.
When a user interacts regularly after mutual liking then that activeness is also used as a factor to show matches to profiles.
3. Facebook profile
Facebook profile is another way through which the Tinder mobile app suggests potential matches. Some information is taken from the Facebook profile such as mutual friends or common interests and then those are used to suggest matches on the dating app.
4. Other factors
There are other ways the app finds a match for its users. Some of the suggestions that a user gets are of those profiles that have already swiped right on them and are waiting for the user to swipe right in order to get a match.
Now that we have looked into the functionality of the Tinder-like app, it is time to look into the technologies that are used in the making of one of the most popular dating apps of our time.
Tech Stack of Tinder Like App Development
- Application & Data – AngularJS
- Utilities- Google Analytics, SendGrid
- Buisness Tools- G Suite, Zendesk
While the above tech stack is specific to Tinder, you don’t necessarily have to rely on them for your app as well.
Now that we have seen how the app works and the ways it finds potential matches, let’s look at the money involved. There are basically four ways such dating apps make money:
How much money do dating apps make?
1. Subscription:
Some apps give users a trial period to use the app for free and after that period is over a subscription fee is needed to be paid to continue the usage of services. This is one of the most common ways to make money. Tinder launched Tinder Plus for users with additional features that seeing people who have swiped right on their profile. The subscription fee for under 30 years is $10 monthly and for people above 30 years is $20 monthly.
2. Ads:
Ads are spaces for third party companies. For advertising on the apps like Tinder, which has a huge audience, advertisers have to pay a good sum of money. Although it hasn’t been disclosed officially by the app about the cost of ads on its mobile apps, a source found out that it costs $5000 and above for one ad placement.
3. In-app purchases:
The in-app payment integration can be made by users to access certain special features such as emojis, icons, etc. This is a way of earning for apps like Tinder.
4. Premium plans:
When companies build an app like Tinder, they keep certain special features locked. These features can only be unlocked after paying a certain sum.
5. Others:
Dating apps have other features as well. For example, in Bumble dating app female users only see the matches for 24 hours after which the match disappears. So if the male users want females to see their request for longer, they will need to buy the extended time of 24 hours.
With this, you now know what it takes to develop an app that works just like Tinder and also the different ways you can make money off of your app. The next and last section that we are left to discuss is – How much would it all cost you before you start making profits on your app.
Let’s answer that for you.
How much does it cost to develop an app like Tinder?
Noting the features that are prevalent in the app, it can be assumed that the cost to develop apps like Tinder would come somewhere around $40,000 to $50,000. However, this is a very rough estimate. There are a number of factors that can increase or lower the mobile app development cost.
Now that you have gathered the complete understanding of not just the Tinder clone app market potential but also the answer of how to build a dating app like Tinder, along with the near actual cost estimate of the app development, it is time to use that information and contact our team of mobile app development experts and get your Tinder clone app made.
