Is Grindr really growing while other dating apps shrink?

Yes, according to the FY2025 10-Ks. Grindr's revenue rose 27.6% and its paying users rose about 17%, and it was solidly profitable. Over the same year Match Group's revenue was roughly flat with total payers down about 5% (Tinder down 7%), and Bumble's revenue fell about 10% with paying users down 11.5%. Grindr is the clear outlier on every one of those lines.

How does Grindr grow on so little marketing?

Grindr spent about $11.6M on marketing in FY2025 — roughly 2.6% of revenue — versus roughly 17–18% at Match Group and Bumble. The figures are from the filings; the explanation is our reading of them: Grindr is effectively the one large network for its audience, so growth comes from the network itself rather than from paid acquisition. That's an interpretation of the numbers, not a line in the 10-K.

How many Grindr users actually pay?

About 8%. Grindr reported roughly 1.26M average paying users against 14.99M monthly active users in FY2025, and average revenue per paying user of $24.25. Most users never pay — the business runs on a small, high-value paying minority.

Does Grindr face the same business-model risk as Match Group?

Structurally, yes. The exact 'if our users do not convert to paying users… our business may be significantly harmed' risk language appears verbatim in Grindr's 10-K as well as Match's and Bumble's. The dependency is identical across the category; what differs is the outcome — Grindr is currently winning on the same risk the others are losing on.

Why Grindr is growing while the rest of the dating industry shrinks

Grindr's FY2025 10-K shows revenue up 27.6% and paying users up 17% while Match and Bumble shrink — on almost no marketing. Here's what its filing reveals.

One number reframes the whole "are dating apps dying?" debate: in their FY2025 annual filings, Match Group's revenue was roughly flat and Bumble's fell about 10% — but Grindr's rose 27.6%, its paying users rose about 17%, and it did this spending almost nothing on marketing. The standing story that dating apps are in decline is half right. One of them is having its best year, and its own 10-K shows exactly how. This is what the filing reveals.

The numbers that don't match the industry

Put the three public dating companies side by side, straight from their FY2025 10-Ks, and Grindr is the outlier on every line that matters:

Company (FY2025)	Revenue	Revenue YoY	Paying users YoY	Marketing (% of revenue)	Net income
Grindr (GRND)	$439.9M	+27.6%	+16.9%	$11.6M (~2.6%)	+$94.8M (21.5%)
Match Group (MTCH)	$3,487.2M	~flat (+0.2%)	−5% (Tinder −7%)	$625.5M (~18%)	+$613.4M (17.6%)
Bumble Inc. (BMBL)	$965.7M	−9.9%	−11.5%	$165.5M (~17%)	−$693.1M †

† Read past Bumble's bottom line

Bumble's −$693.1M net loss is dominated by a $1,039.0M non-cash impairment — an accounting write-down of goodwill, not cash leaving the business. Its operating performance is far less negative than the bottom line suggests. We flag it so the table isn't misread as "Bumble lost $693M in cash." (More on this trap in how to read a dating company's 10-K.)

The mainstream apps are doing the opposite of growing. Match Group is holding revenue flat only by charging a shrinking payer base more — we walk through that mechanic in how dating apps grow revenue while losing users. Bumble is shrinking outright. Grindr is the one company adding both users and revenue.

The tell is in the marketing line

The single most striking cell in that table is the marketing column. Match Group and Bumble each spend roughly 17–18% of their revenue on marketing. Grindr spends about 2.6% — $11.6M against $439.9M of revenue — and still grew nearly 28%.

Filing fact vs. our reading

The dollar figures (marketing spend, revenue, payers) are read from the FY2025 10-Ks. The reason — that Grindr is, in practice, the one large network for its audience, so its growth comes from the network effect rather than paid acquisition — is our interpretation of those numbers, not a statement in the filing. We separate the two on purpose: a sticky, single-destination network needing almost no marketing is the most defensible explanation for a 2.6% marketing ratio that still produces growth, but the filing reports the spend, not the cause.

This is what a network effect looks like once it shows up in audited accounts. When the people you want to reach are already concentrated on one app, you don't have to buy them — which is also why a contracting marketing budget can sit next to a growing user count without contradiction.

The same risk language, the opposite result

Here's the detail that ties Grindr back to the rest of the industry. The core dependency Match Group writes into its risk factors — that its business depends on retaining users, adding users, and converting them to payers — appears verbatim in Grindr's 10-K too:

The shared dependency (verbatim, all three filings)

"If we fail to retain existing users or add new users, or if our users do not convert to paying users, our revenue, financial results, and business may be significantly harmed."

Match, Bumble and Grindr all describe the identical pressure in identical words. That tells you the dependency is structural to the category, not a Grindr advantage. What differs is the outcome: on the exact risk the others are currently losing on — retaining and converting users — Grindr is currently winning. Same business model, same stated fear, different scoreboard.

The paying base is small either way. Grindr reported roughly 1.26M average paying users against 14.99M monthly active users — about 8% conversion — at an average revenue per paying user of $24.25. The growth isn't coming from everyone suddenly paying; it's a small, high-value minority getting larger in step with the network.

What Grindr actually proves about the industry

The temptation is to read Grindr as "the app that figured it out." The more useful read is what the contrast proves about the whole sector. Lay the FY2025 growth rates next to each other:

Growing	Shrinking
Hinge +26% (intent-led design)	Tinder −4% (first-ever annual decline)
Grindr +28% (sticky single-audience network)	Bumble app −10%, Badoo −11%

The line that splits winners from losers isn't "dating apps" versus "not dating apps." It's broad, mass-market swipe (contracting) versus intent-led or tightly-defined-audience apps (growing). Hinge and Grindr have almost nothing in common as products — but both serve a clearer purpose for a clearer audience than open-ended swiping does, and both grew while Tinder and Bumble fell. Grindr is just the extreme version of the pattern: the most concentrated audience, the stickiest network, the lowest marketing, the highest growth. You can see where each app sits across the field on our state of the dating apps page.

What the filing won't settle

Reading one company's strong year well also means not over-reading it:

One year isn't a trend. A +27.6% revenue year is in the filing; whether it repeats isn't. We report what FY2025 says, not what FY2026 will.
Market cap isn't in here. Grindr's market value moves daily and is secondary-market data — not a figure from the 10-K. Don't confuse "the stock did X" with "the company reported X."
"Why" is analysis, not disclosure. The filing gives the spend, the growth and the user counts. The network-effect explanation is our reasoning from those numbers — strong, but labelled as reasoning.

Where these figures come from

All financial figures are read from the FY2025 Form 10-Ks of Grindr (GRND), Match Group (MTCH) and Bumble (BMBL), with revenue independently re-confirmed against the SEC's XBRL company-concept API. Monthly-active-user and paying-user counts are the companies' own reported operating metrics. Market caps and any market-size figures are secondary and flagged wherever they appear. The filings themselves are linked on our SEC filings page.

The takeaway

If you only know one thing about the dating-app market in FY2025, make it this: the industry isn't uniformly declining — broad swipe apps are shrinking while intent-led and tightly-defined-audience apps grow, and Grindr is the clearest proof, with revenue up 27.6% and users up 17% on a 2.6% marketing budget. The same risk language that reads like a warning in Match's and Bumble's filings reads like a description of a winning hand in Grindr's. Read the rest of the field — public and private — on who owns what, and the filings behind every number on our SEC filings page.