Rivet Is the New Dating App Where Strangers Pick Your Match, Not You

Dating app burnout is real, and a new app called Rivet thinks the fix is handing your love life to strangers. Created by former Tinder executive Taru Kapoor, Rivet skips the endless swiping and lets“matchers”vote on who should date whom.

Here’s how it works. Matchers browse anonymous profiles with personality traits, interests, and physical preferences, plus an AI-generated image of the potential pair. They vote yes with a pink heart or no with a silver X, and all those votes build a“Social Matching”score that nudges the two singles to start chatting. The daters still get the final say on whether they meet in person. Singles can even see the percentage of matchers who voted yes, along with a bot-written explanation.

Rivet joins a growing wave of alternatives to traditional swipe apps, including Bethenny Frankel’s peer-matchmaking app The Core. Kapoor’s pitch is that apps turned finding someone into a lonely search, and the people around us often know what brings out our best. The question is whether a stranger’s vote is helpful perspective or just more noise.

So we have to ask: would you let complete strangers pick your dates? Sound off in the comments.