Post Date: January 28, 2020

Hinge, a mobile dating app, is one of the mobile apps that has entered the ring of dating apps. Like other dating apps, the user is shown a card stack of potential companions, and it’s up to the user to sift through them. Hinge, however, is different from other mobile dating apps.

Hinge is different from Tinder because of its reputation and the audience it attracts. Hinge markets itself as an app for relationships, encouraging users to delete it once they find love. Tinder is geared more toward hooking up.

We’re going to break down the main differences below and help you make an informed decision on whether to download it or not. We’ll also give you a detailed description of their premium service, unlocking certain features.

Discover the world of Hinge: Dive into the world of Hinge with The Complete Guide To Hinge, your ultimate resource for understanding the app’s features and success strategies in modern dating.

Differences Between Hinge & Tinder

Hinge is entirely different from other dating apps. Below, we will show why it differs from Tinder and other dating apps.

Reputation

Hinge established itself as the “relationship app right out of the gate.” Hinge was founded in 2012 by Justin McLeod to keep online dating honest and straightforward.

Never has Hinge pushed an agenda of being a casual dating app but simply an app to meet and find your next true love!

Like most dating apps, Hinge features profiles that appear once they’ve liked or disliked. Hinge’s significant user experience compared to the rest of the dating apps is that it doesn’t require the user to swipe.

This is important because the like button is on the right side (closest to the thumb for a right-handed phone holder), and the dislike button is on the left side (far away from the phone holder). This design forces users to slow down their decision-making and take time to look at profiles.

This design element has caused a ripple effect and forces the user to understand a person’s interests instead of swiping left and right if someone is “hot or not.”

Users On The App

Hinge added to its squeaky clean image and launched a “designed to be deleted campaign.” This marketing piqued the interest of many singles looking for relationships, as the app told them it wanted them to delete it.

Typically, mobile apps will try to keep you on the app as long as possible as you pile through hundreds and sometimes thousands of profiles.

Hinge made its message loud and clear – find your soulmate and delete our app. Although this isn’t ideal for business and keeping a customer for recurring revenue, it opened up the transparency between the user and the mobile app.

This has helped Hinge spread organically as users will take Hinge’s users as people looking for relationships, not just casual dating.


❤️ Better Than Tinder: Tinder is great for casual relationships, but a lot more users are looking for serious relationships on it. Avoid the stress, arguments, and drama if you’re simply looking for something casual.

If you’re looking for a platform with users strictly looking for casual relationships & hookups, we recommend checking out Ashley Madison.

Hinge Features

Hinge is built differently than other mobile apps. As mentioned, they have eliminated the swipe feature, which forces users to slow down and read the profile.

Hinge also has some exciting features rarely seen in other mobile apps.

See Who Likes You Immediately

When you “like” a person’s profile, the other user gets a notification immediately, letting them know they’ve been liked.

Hinge Toolbar

This feature is usually hidden behind a paywall, forcing you to subscribe to unlock. Hinge gives the user access to see who liked them right away. This is another element that speeds up the dating process are they can go through if they want to like the other party back or not.

Users can see who likes them in the toolbar at the bottom, signified by the heart icon.

However, Hinge does withhold some of the likes available to see in the preferred membership section for more popular accounts.

Your Turn Notifications

This is Hinge’s most innovative feature, and psychologically, it helps people from ghosting.

Your Turn hinge

If you’re unfamiliar with ghosting, it’s essentially when you’ve been talking to someone, whether it be for five messages or five messages, and you stop talking to them for no transparent reason.

This term has become popular in the dating world as guys and girls will find something better, not interested in the other party, or get bored. Instead of telling the other person, they’ll stop talking to them.

Hinge has created a slight change in the design of their mobile app, called the “your turn” notification. Essentially, it is a purple banner that says “your turn” above the chat.

This is significant because it triggers the “badge” notification, so users will constantly be reminded ( if they have the badge notification on) that they have a message to respond to. For those who like a clean home screen, this badge icon can be annoying and subconsciously triggers you to reply or delete the user.

A small design in the app helps users respond to their match and continue the conversation, which helps to avoid being ghosted.

Restricted Likes

Restricted likes are great because they force other users to be extremely picky about their daily likes. Hinge allows you to send ten likes a day before they shut the user down for the day, forcing you to pay for a monthly subscription.

Sending ten likes a day is nothing compared to the hundreds you could send with other mobile apps. There’s no rapid swiping and praying that you find a match.

Restricted likes make the guy or girl go through each profile and decide if they want to use 1 of their ten likes on that particular person. Hinge has changed the game to be about quality, not about quantity.

The downside of restricted likes is obvious; you’re only restricted to 10 matches a day unless you pay for premium features.

Again, we favor restricted access, forcing the user to choose wisely.

Hinge Vs. Tinder Cost

Hinge Preferred is a premium membership with a bundle of features and unlockables. Here are some of the features Hinge offers:

  • See everyone who likes you
  • Set advanced preferences
  • Send unlimited likes
Hinge preferred pricing

Like most mobile apps, the pay structure is built with pricing tiers. One month of Hinge Preferred is $19.99, 3 months is $39.99, and for six months, it’s $59.99.

Tinder has similar pricing, $24.99 for one month. Read more about Tinder Gold pricing here.

If you’re looking to increase your likes or have a popular account that gets multiple likes that you want to unlock, the preferred membership may be suitable for you.

One other feature is locking the advanced filters. This feature is unlocked if you have kids or care about dating someone. Other unlocking features in Hinge Preferred:

  • Height
  • Children
  • Family Plans
  • Educational Level
  • Politics
  • Drinking
  • Smoking

All of these filters can be set to your liking to weed out the people who do/don’t have these recreational activities and personal preferences. This is a great way to limit the field to precisely what you want.

We believe Hinge Preferred is worth it if you’re trying to narrow down the type of guy or girl of your dreams. This could help accelerate the process in an environment meant to facilitate love.


❤️ Pro Tip: If you’re sick of finding people who are just looking for one-night stands, we recommend trying eHarmony.

It’s one of the highest-rated online dating apps in the world. eHarmony users are actually actively looking for relationships. Give it a try here for free and see if you can tell the difference.

Hinge Vs. Tinder Recap

Hinge is different from other mobile dating apps because it’s designed to be deleted, encouraging people to find love rather than casual dating.

Hinge is different as they aren’t a card stack dating app, meaning users take more time to look at the user’s profile instead of swiping left and right rapidly. Users are also only allowed roughly ten likes per day, which causes users to be pickier about who they use it.

If you liked this blog, learn more about Hinge in these articles:

About the Author

Julia has over 10+ years in the mobile dating app space as a consultant and analyst. Her work has been featured on top websites like Mashable and Women's Health Mag. She writes these blogs to help singles find their true love and life long companion!