Women Are Much More Selective And Find 80% Of Men Unattractive On Dating Apps, Per Recent Research
At this point just about everyone has had some kind of experience in the dating app world, whether it's brief or it led us to find our spouse. Research shows that women are actually much more selective on these platforms than men are.
It's no secret that the dating scene isn't exactly hospitable for singles these days, and even though there are fewer people getting married than ever before, there are more than enough people out there looking for a relationship of some kind. In 2020, it was estimated that 44.2 million people used online dating services in the US and it's predicted that this number will increase to 53.3 million in 2025. But recent research shows that women are actually much pickier about which men they find attractive, and it's likely harming their chance at finding their husband.
Women Are Much More Selective on Dating Apps Than Men Are, per Recent Research
Twitter user @datepsych, Alexander, regularly posts content about dating statistics and compelling behavioral research, and his bio indicates that his research interests are specifically in "attractiveness & dating." He shared a thread called "new study on male dating app profiles and matches," quoting a line from the research, "Only one profile out of 100 was liked by more than 80% of women."
The study finds that women only swipe right 30% of the time; about 20% of all female dating app users also turn down more than 80% of the potential male suitors on the apps. The results showed that out of a group of 100 profiles of bachelors, only 1 profile was "liked" by more than 80% of the women, and yet 38 of the profiles were "disliked" by that same group of participants.
"This is an effect that I have described in the past. Although we see high inter-rater agreement on attractiveness, agreement of individual pairs in a sample can be much lower. In other words, there can be high disagreement even for what an attractive face is," Andrew tweets.
Popular YouTube channel Better Bachelor posted a similar video explaining how women are only selecting the top 1% of men to be their potential mate, demanding that their future husband have a six-pack, a six-figure income, fancy car, and a fantastic sense of humor, among other things. Meanwhile, an OkCupid study found that women find 80% of men unattractive on dating apps.
Alexander also pointed out on Twitter that women generally aren't interested in huge age gaps, which is to be expected. "Age predicted attractiveness ratings and swipes for men: men too much older, or too much younger, than the women were penalized," he wrote. "Pretty consistent with past research indicating that women don't like large age gaps."
The study also confirmed that any profiles that didn't have clear, high-resolution photos generated much less interest. Attraction is reported as a top factor for selection, but it also matters if the pictures are of good quality.
This makes many people feel less sympathetic to the women who complain about the lack of success they've had on dating apps. At some point, they have to admit that they're not helping their chances by being hyper-selective, especially if they're not in the top 1% themselves.