Bumble is investing more in AI and new features to stay relevant as dating behavior shifts among younger users. At Goldman Sachs' annual tech conference on Monday, Bumble CEO Rhydian Jones revealed details about the app's upcoming AI features, including photo selection tools and features to help with conversations and profile creation.
Jones previously teased these features during Bumble's most recent earnings call.
On a conference call with investors, she said: “We're also introducing new AI-powered features, including AI-assisted photo selection to ease the profile creation process and conversation support to help customers feel confident and present their best version of themselves. We have an ambitious vision for how AI can enhance the value we provide to customers at each step of the dating process: profile creation, discovery, engagement and, at the core of our matching model.”
The new AI-powered features are expected to be released on the app this winter.
Bumble's photo selection tool will increase competition from Tinder, which is releasing an AI “photo selector” feature this summer to suggest selfies taken from users' camera rolls. Tinder currently boasts 9.6 million paying users, while Bumble had 2.8 million users as of Q2 2024.
Jones' comments yesterday suggested the company is also working on developing additional tools to help with profile creation, but did not provide specific details.
“We want to keep the bar for creating a profile high, but we want to make it less of a pain for users. Users are very nervous about creating a profile. We want to make it as smooth as possible. So creating a profile is a big challenge,” Jones said at the conference.
Creating a profile involves more than uploading a photo; users must also create an appealing profile and prompts to attract potential matches. It's unclear at this time how Bumble plans to enhance this experience with AI. Bumble did not respond to a request for comment.
If Bumble were to release additional AI profile creation features, the company could copy the feature from Tinder's future product roadmap. Tinder's CPO, Mark Van Ryswyk, has previously mentioned the idea of using generative AI to create profiles for dating profiles.
Bumble for Friends has an AI-generated icebreaker feature to help users write their messages. Image credit: Bumble
Plus, using AI to encourage singles to be more creative with their opening lines seems like a natural fit for Bumble: Last year, the company released an AI-generated icebreaker feature for its friendship-focused product, Bumble for Friends, so it would make sense for the dating app to roll out a similar feature, which allows users to generate messages based on a match's profile.
Jones said:[Another] A big factor is that our customers are happier, more successful, and having healthier conversations with each other. So we want to give people more support to engage in healthy conversations.”
In addition to the newly announced AI features, we can expect to see Bumble expand its AI approach further in the future. Bumble founder Whitney Wolfe Herd previously talked about her idea for online dating being an AI “dating concierge” or assistant that might accompany users on multiple dates on their behalf.
Bumble, meanwhile, has been using AI to bolster its safety features for several years now: its “Fakery Detection” tool finds and removes fake profiles, spammers, and scammers, its “Private Detection” feature automatically blurs nude photos, and more recently, it introduced a new option for members to report profiles if they believe the photos or videos were generated using AI.
Jones reiterated during the conference that new paid features are on the way as Bumble continues to improve its free experience, including expanding “opening moves,” adding interest filters, allowing users to customize chat timers (currently users only have 24 hours to message each other) and improving its matching algorithm.
The company also has plans for its recently acquired community platform, Geneva, which it is preparing for a re-release in late fall.