It doesn’t matter how high your self-confidence is, once you’ve gone through a dry period of matches on Hinge, you start reaching for the tinfoil hat and coming up with conspiracy theories.
You find yourself asking, does Hinge know how attractive you are? Or worse, does Hinge decide if you’re ugly?
Thankfully, you don’t have to walk around with your head wrapped up like a baked potato. Does Hinge know how attractive you are? The answer is no. But… it is a little bit more complicated than that.
Hinge may not know exactly how attractive you are, but that is what it’s trying to work out, not just based on your pictures but on the kinds of interactions you’re having on the app. Hinge hopes it can work out not just the type of profiles you like, but the type that’s likely to end up in a match.
By tracking when you liked that comment where someone confessed to loving pineapple on her pizza, or when you spent the whole night chatting about your favorite of the Marvel movies (it’s Thor: Ragnarok, don’t @ me) Hinge decides what works for you.
Of course, a lot more factors come into play here but, use the app often enough and Hinge will start to get a pretty good idea of how attractive you are – at least in terms of the app.
Aka, how often do people respond to you? How often do people like you? It may not be based on just looks, but it is an overall attractiveness score in itself I suppose.
So, rest assured, Hinge has not decided you’re physically unattractive. But, spend enough being a jerk to every profile you find on the Hinge dating app, and it might decide your personality is ugly enough, and put your profile in a less desirable category.
If you need more information on Hinge before diving deeper into the algorithm, check out my article on the ins and outs of Hinge.
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How Does Hinge Know Your Type?
Hinge is described as the app ‘designed to be deleted’, and that’s in part because it aims to match you not just with the people you like, but the people who will like you back.
But, how does Hinge know your type? Compared to places like Tinder and Bumble, which are primarily tracking how swipe-happy you get, the Hinge dating app asks you to be just a little more considered with each profile.
The app is looking at the kind of prompts you’re responding to, the photos you like, and how popular the profiles you take an interest in are on the wider Hinge dating site.
At a more basic level, it’s responding to the filters you put in place.
Compared to other apps, Hinge has a pretty advanced set of filters to choose from, allowing you to sift for things like age and proximity, but also religion, ethnicity, or if they’re happy to split a dessert at dinner (alright, I might have made that last one up).
Go premium on Hinge with Hinge Preferred, and you’ll get access to even more advanced filters including:
- height
- whether someone has children
- whether someone wants children
- politics
- drinking
- smoking
- drug use
But remember, too many narrow filters can prevent potential matches from showing up. Ease up a little. No match is PERFECT, and you never know who could surprise you.
And Hinge agrees. Its Most Compatible feature, which each day presents you with the person it views as someone you’re incredibly likely to hit it off with, may surprise you with the kind of person it suggests.
But keep an open mind! During testing, couples that were matched by Most Compatible were 8 times more likely to swap phone numbers, compared to those who matched elsewhere on the app.
How Does The Hinge Algorithm Work?
You don’t need to be a computer science major to get to grips with the algorithms of popular dating sites (I mean, thank God, or that’d make my job a lot harder!)
In fact, a basic understanding of just how the Hinge algorithm works, can make a huge difference to the way you use the app, and how attractive the app views you as.
According to the app’s director of relationship science Logan Ury, Hinge uses a version of the Gale Shapley algorithm, which not only tries to show users people it thinks they’ll like, but people it thinks will like them back too. It’s an algorithm so smart it literally won a Nobel prize.
These decisions are based on the profiles you interact with, the prompts you give likes to, and the interactions that turn into long conversations, but also how other people respond to your profile.
When you initially start using Hinge, you’ll be shown the newest profiles, as Hinge tries to work out the attractiveness of its newest members.
So, if you’re looking to meet the partner of your dreams on there, you’d better have your profile in good shape from the day you start.
So, if you’re concerned about how your Hinge profile has been positioned by the algorithm, try making some basic changes to your profile such as:
- Photos: make sure you have a full set of clear photos of yourself, even if that means having to ask a friend to take a couple of glamorous headshots for you.
- Interesting Profile: Avoid clichéd answers to prompts. Yes, we know the secret to getting to know you is ‘just ask’, but maybe you could ‘just tell them’. And if you need additional tips on exactly how to be interesting, take a look at Tinder Hacked. It has Tinder in the title, yes, but the advice is applicable across the board.
- Location: It’s easiest to find matches if you’re somewhere densely populated. The more remote you are, the less matches are coming your way.
Does Hinge Show You Everyone?
As you’ve hopefully seen in this article, Hinge isn’t going to show you everyone on the dating app. And it’s not because it has made a decision on how physically attractive you are!
No, it’s because, compared to apps like Tinder, Hinge wants you to take it a little slower. The profiles you see will be, for the most part, profiles of potential partners that the app thinks you will really hit it off with.
On top of that, to make sure you’re really considering each like and message and potential match, a free Hinge account only allows you 10 likes per day! I’ve seen friends on Tinder get through that many in 3.2 seconds.
However, if that sounds a little constrictive, upgrading to Hinge Preferred, which ranges from:
- $14.99 per month (if you get 6 months at once)
- $19.99 per month (if you get 3 months at once)
- $29.99 for a single month
- These prices were correct at the time of writing, but are subject to change
This will allow you unlimited likes, and you can tap away until your thumbs start to ache.
Final Thoughts
Hinge isn’t looking at your jawline or how much hair you have and ranking you out of ten. Don’t worry about that sort of thing.
What it is doing, however, is seeing how you use the app and how people respond to you.
It’s less about how attractive you are, but instead what kind of people are attractive to you.
If this all sounds a little too restrictive for you, maybe Hinge isn’t your best bet. Try our free quiz to see which online dating app is best suited for you.
And remember, try to not to worry what an algorithm thinks of you. You’re looking great, I’m sure.
