Bumble Wants AI to Be ‘A Supercharger to Love and Relationships’

At Code Conference 2023, Bumble CEO Whitney Wolfe Herd explained how the company wants to increase the use of artificial intelligence in its apps, from coaching users in dating and relationships to one day using AI as intelligent matchmakers to save users a lot of swiping.

Herd had first revealed that Bumble was investing in AI in a Bloomberg interview earlier this month and explained on stage at Code Conference in Dana Point, California, how AI could improve matches, save users time and even coach them. 

“I really think about AI as a supercharger to love and relationships,” Herd said. Bumble is thinking of using AI to help folks before meeting other users too, by alleviating worries that they’ll be bad at dating. “We can actually leverage AI to train people to interact in a way that makes them feel positive so that they can get to the human,” she said.

She clarified that Bumble doesn’t want to replace humans with bots or have them fall in love with a digital partner (no Her situations, then). Bumble wants to integrate AI in a way that reduces the time from matching to meeting in person: “We are definitely not in the business of keeping you on your phone forever,” Herd said. 

In the future, Bumble could even use AI as a sort of matchmaker that uses preferred dating parameters and deal breakers — values, ideal vacations and best ways to spend a weeknight, Herd gave as examples — to swiftly sift through the massive amounts of potential daters and present only the most likely matches to users. Perhaps AI could even use image recognition to match restaurants and brands one person likes (presumably from profile photos) that other users like.

This could be bundled into something Herd acknowledged Bumble is currently working on: a more exclusive tier of service above Bumble Premium that will be priced higher and do a lot of the matchmaking for you. 

“I hear from women friends of mine say, ‘I don’t have time to get on this dating app and swipe for an hour — can Bumble just do it for me? I’ll pay whatever you want,” Herd said. While she didn’t offer more details on pricing or availability, she said it would be an “AI-supercharged” version of the current products that “feels very curated, very selective.”

Herd reiterated Bumble’s commitment to protecting users as the company continues exploring AI, and it’s developing a set of terms and conditions to clarify to users how it will use AI tools. Given the proliferation of AI abuse in (for instance) pornographic deepfake imitations, which Bumble has vowed to fight with tech and media partners, this disclosure fits Bumble and will be part of “a suite of other initiatives” in the realm of legislation, Herd said.

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