Tinder: Digital Intimacy in the Dating App Era

Since Tinder's launch in 2012, the app and its iconic swipe have sparked controversy, shaped the matchmaking industry, and changed how people date. In the first book-length scholarly exploration of Tinder, Stefanie Duguay traces the app's debut, rise to popularity, and the complicated relationship that many people have with it. She examines shifting interpretations of Tinder's purpose – from hook-ups to finding true love – alongside changes in verifying users' authenticity, ensuring safety, and generating revenue. She argues that Tinder's prominence has set the stage for how intimacy operates online. While positive for some users, others experience hostility, which leaves them fielding malicious reporting, harassment, reduced algorithmic visibility, and other challenges in using a technology that has become focal to many people's partner-seeking. Duguay concludes that noticing how these conditions have formed on Tinder enables us to imagine new ways of dating digitally in the future. Arriving when some have heralded the end of dating apps, this book illuminates how Tinder's legacy will continue to influence dating in the long term. It is essential reading for students and scholars in media and communication studies, sociology, gender and sexuality studies, and anyone who has ever thought of swiping right.

• Publication date: 18 September 2026
• Page count: 276
• Dimensions: Height 148 mm; Width 210 mm; Thickness 23 mm
• Publisher: Polity Press
• Format: Paperback
• ISBN-13: 9781509562695