Grindr Partners with AWS, Anthropic for AI Matchmaking Tool

Grindr is expanding its artificial intelligence capabilities through new partnerships with Amazon Web Services and AI firm Anthropic. The company announced the rollout of a new feature, “A-List,” powered by Anthropic’s Claude Sonnet 3.7 model and AWS’s Bedrock platform. The tool is designed to enhance user experience by surfacing past interactions and generating summaries of conversations to help users reconnect or discover new matches.

Initially, the feature will be accessible to 25% of Grindr Unlimited subscribers by the end of April, as the company cautiously manages deployment costs. CEO George Arison highlighted the move to Amazon’s infrastructure as a privacy-conscious decision, noting the flexibility of Bedrock in supporting multiple AI models. The transition also marks a shift from Grindr’s previous AI provider, Ex-human Inc., which will now serve in a consulting role.

As more platforms move beyond geolocation-based matching to leverage AI for deeper context-driven compatibility. Grindr, which pioneered location-based dating in 2009, now sees AI as the next evolution in digital matchmaking. The company reported having 14.2 million monthly active users in 2024, a 7% increase from the prior year, with the AI presumably being part of their efforts to further increase that number.

While Grindr has managed to halve its per-user AI-related costs in just four months, the rollout strategy echoes that of other dating apps: limit AI features to premium tiers to offset the heavy compute costs involved. However, despite the industry’s push toward AI, user skepticism remains. Surveys show many users are wary of AI’s role in dating, particularly around concerns of authenticity and privacy. Grindr’s focus, therefore, appears to be on augmenting – not replacing – human connection with AI-powered tools.