Common Trends in Modern Dating: What We're Seeing in 2025 and How to Navigate It All
By Selina Nguyen
Amid the sea of dating apps and run clubs, dating looks very different these days.
Many folks both in our sessions and outside of them, report being fatigued by dating apps and screens in favour of meeting new people in the wild and prioritising genuine, felt connection.
In 2024, we saw the rise of local run clubs as the “new dating apps” in many cities internationally, but particularly here in Sydney, as well as the re-emergence of speed dating and singles events. The popularity of hobby groups, local meet-ups and community events has been bigger than ever, and has proven to be a steadfast way to meet new people and to connect through shared interests and hobbies.
What makes this such an effective dating strategy and trend, is that these IRL experiences are often regular events and meet-ups that can support in building a sense of familiarity and community with those who also attend. As a result of that regularity, you can get to know folks and build a rapport over a period of time, and it can help relieve some of the pressure to make a good and quick first impression.
Another positive of community-based social events being organised around hobbies and activities that we hopefully enjoy, is that we can lean into the parts of ourselves that are happier and more confident in that space, and that in itself can be an attractive quality for dating.
Especially for folks within specific communities, for example the queer, kink, and/or disabled communities, and the like, events that are specifically designed with these groups at the fore-front is a meaningful way to engage and meet new people with similar lived experiences or values. This is increasingly becoming an important aspect of dating and connection.
Community Dating Experiences
The standards for what makes a good romantic or sexual partner are changing as more folks are going to therapy, learning about themselves, and starting to have more frank conversations with potential partners about previously taboo topics including sexual preferences, mental health, or finances.
Folks are learning more about what is important to them and the relationships they want, and they’re leaning into it. In doing so, it also gives us more ideas for where to meet new people beyond the dating app landscape.
For example, for folks who are sex-positive and value that in relationships, attending sex-related book launches, workshops, or sex parties, can be great ways to meet new people with similar interests.
It’s worthwhile looking up your local events and seeing what’s out there because there are always new and exciting organisations centring connection and facilitating new and fun experiences for you to attend.
In Eora/Sydney alone, we’re so lucky to have Love Club run by practitioners from our very own Good Vibes Clinic. There’s also Cupid’s Club, Dear Pluto or Thursday.
Making the Apps Fun
However, it’s not all dread and terror on the dating apps.
Many folks are reinventing the wheel and using such technology to make dating fun again.For example, creating a joint dating app profile with a best friend to match with potential dates and for the date to also invite a friend, how cute!
Some folks are hosting “group dates,” where a group of friends each invite a date online to form one big group date. Others are printing business cards with their contact details on them to hand out to potential dates.
These new and novel experiences are helping take the pressure off dating and to re-centre connection in all of its glorious forms, to share the experience with a good friend, to potentially make a new friend, to host a fun meet-cute, to witness other people connecting, to flirt and play with new people.
These are creative and innovative ways that dating is changing lately as folks make dating work for them, rather than the other way around.
Dating and Technology
Speaking of technology, a new trend that is also emerging specifically amongst younger people, is using AI technology like ChatGPT as a round-the-clock dating coach.
According to the founder of My Peach AI, an AI-companion platform, Ashley Neale reported on the Future Tense podcast, Sex tech, AI and the centrality of consent, that many folks were using their AI-companions to get date ideas, proof-read text messages and get personalised dating advice.
While a lot of growing AI technology remains incredibly controversial, this is an interesting reflection and development in the world of dating and will inevitably continue beyond 2025. It highlights our cultural hunger for connection, but also the simultaneous and fundamental want to do it well, right and successfully.
The dating landscape can be fresh and energizing, or depressing and demoralising, depending on how you choose to look and approach it.
Something that shines through a lot of the conversations inside and outside of clinic sessions is that folks are leaning into who they are, their strengths, and what’s important to them, as well as the technology at their fingertips. This is creating a wonderful shift in not only dating tips and practical ideas, but also in how we view ourselves and the journey of meeting new people.
Like most things, dating is what you make of it.
Check out this free dating reflection exercise if you’re looking for more ways to add intentionality to your dating experience!