Jeff Caplan’s Minute of News: The decline of online dating

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SALT LAKE CITY — Almost an entire generation of married couples met via online dating, but the tide seems to be turning.  Bumble, Match and the rest have seen their stock prices tank as more and more Gen Zers want to meet-up IRL. “In Real Life.”

Online dating has lost its luster. For the convenience of efficiently sifting through potential soulmates, you have to contend with creeps, liars, cheaters and lunatics. To a lot of young people, it’s too dangerous. 

Eventbrite is a website where people planning public get-togethers. They report that more Zoomers want to find that special someone at actual face-to-face social events, like hobby groups, sports get togethers and even game nights.  Eventbrite says attendance at such live interactions is up 42% in the past year. For goodness sake,  speed dating is popular again. 

If you don’t know what speed dating is: participants go from table to table, sitting down for as little as three and as long as eight minutes, having a getting-to-know you discussion. And then you go on to the next table. Time runs out and if sparks fly at any stop, congratulations, you’ve met your true love. Be fruitful and multiply.

GenZ is willing to go through all that to find a partner. And if that doesn’t work, maybe next they’ll turn the clock back even further to arranged marriages.  Zoomers love vintage things so much, it might not be long ’til we’re trading our kids for two cows and a couple chickens.

Jeff Caplan is the host of Jeff Caplan’s Afternoon News on KSL NewsRadio. Follow him on Facebook and X. 

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