East London Food & Culture

London’s biggest dating app

You might not know this, but Badoo is this city’s – in fact the world’s – most popular dating platform. If you're single, the question is why aren’t you on it?
Badoo has an eye-popping 370m users for you to choose from. Photo: Badoo

London-based dating service Badoo now rivals some of the global social networks for eye-popping user numbers, which obviously makes it a fruitful place to be if you’re looking to meet new people at home or when travelling the world.

From just-good-friends types to possible life partners, and all the levels in between, as Badoo shoots ever-closer towards hitting 400m sign-ups, the likelihood that someone you’d really enjoy meeting is currently giving it a whirl grows bigger-by-the-day.

And that means far more choice and better, really decent matches for you, and for them too. Sounds pretty attractive all round.

It seems likely that Badoo has managed this popularity via nifty tech features, including an algorithm to match you up with your celebrity crush lookalikes. Just type in a celeb’s name, and you’ll be presented with loads of lookie-likey types who also happen to be local. This isn’t just very helpful, it’s a bit more realistic too, particularly if your celeb crush is more Long Beach than Leytonstone.

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We also like the clever video dating facilities, which mean it’s possible to check if the person you might go on a real-world date with tomorrow still actually looks like their flattering profile pic today. Genius.

And yet another way to ensure the photo you are admiring isn’t fake or taken 10 years ago is if the user has earned a blue badge verified account. They do this by striking a particular pose for Badoo staff in the shot. Clever stuff that all help make meeting people less of a digital minefield.

With impressive location filters too, including the chance to see which of the Badoo crew crosses your path on the busy streets of London regularly, this app is about much more than compulsive swiping.

With so many different ways to ensure your next date is a hot hit rather than yet another forgettable miss, we can now understand why so many people are joining Badoo. Exciting times in the world of dating.

Badoo is free to download and get started. You can pay for different levels of subscription to enjoy all the really juicy features.

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