Ditto swaps swiping for AI matchmaking to reach Gen Z daters

Ditto, a dating app aimed at Gen Z college students, is betting that this generation is tired enough of swipe-based apps to try an AI matchmaker instead. Co-founders Allen Wang and Eric Liu, who dropped out of UC Berkeley to build the app, set out to help their peers connect without spending hours navigating apps like Tinder and Hinge.

“As Gen Z ourselves, we were firsthand witnessing the behavioral shift in terms of how people are connecting with each other,” Wang told TechCrunch. “We see that people are getting super tired of all the endless swiping and endless small talk, and they’re really looking for something more genuine in real life.”

Instead of a typical swiping app, college students sign up for Ditto by texting an iMessage number along with a code, after which an AI chatbot introduces itself and walks users through onboarding — starting with basic details like name, gender, and birth date, then more specific questions about personality, interests, and dating preferences. Some users even upload photos of celebrity crushes to help the AI understand their type.

Ditto’s algorithm tries to match people not on shared hobbies directly, but on what those hobbies suggest about someone’s personality — pairing an adventurous rock climber with an equally adventurous streetwear-and-skateboarding fan, for instance, even though their interests look different on the surface. Every Wednesday at 7 p.m., Ditto sends users their match for the week, complete with a person, a time, and a location; users simply show up, go on the date, and give feedback that Ditto uses to refine future matches.

Ditto has 150,000 signups, and Wang says about 20% of matches end up going on a date. The app builds a collage-style graphic introducing matched users to each other — an aesthetic other young-founder connection apps like Sonder have also adopted. Safety remains a concern with any app that minimizes time between matching and meeting in person; for now, Ditto’s built-in vetting relies on users having a .edu email tied to their school, as the app remains limited to a few dozen colleges while it works out how to grow safely.

The company has $9.2 million in seed funding from investors including Gradient, Peak XV, and Scribble — Wang says 99% of investors reached out to Ditto directly, drawn in by its presence on LinkedIn and Twitter, including an inbound approach from Duolingo co-founder Severin Hacker. Ditto is now based in San Francisco with 12 full-time employees, and has built notoriety through irreverent marketing stunts like videos of robot antics.

Why it matters

Ditto’s traction suggests a real opening for AI-driven alternatives to swipe-based dating, though the same features that reduce app fatigue — fast AI vetting and quick real-world meetups — also raise the safety stakes as the model tries to scale beyond a tight campus community.