‘Sledging’ Dating Trend Fuels Fake Holiday Relationships

A new dating trend called “sledging” is leaving many young daters feeling hurt and betrayed – or setting them up to feel even more hurt when the relationship is inevitably “sledged” in the new year. In simple terms, sledging involves dragging a partner through the holiday season while secretly planning to end the relationship by New Year’s, effectively using them for comfort during cuffing season.

Claire Rénier, a romance expert from the dating app Happn, warns that this toxic practice is a major red flag for Gen Z. It’s a way for some daters to enjoy short-term benefits like companionship or avoiding awkward family questions about their single status during the holidays, making it a selfish way to simplify the holiday season with no plans for an actual long-term connection.

A survey by Happn of 600 daters aged 18 to 25 revealed that 15% of Gen Z daters admitted to sledging. Many make the decision to break up months before the holidays, with 75% planning their exit by the end of November and some having done so as early as August. This means a surge in apparently-successful matches that are essentially doomed from the start, with at least one half of the relationship having no interest in continuing past a certain cutoff point.

For users, this is emotionally damaging and an incredible betrayal of trust. However, for the industry at large, it also means an expected spike in connections as the end of the year approaches – potentially followed by a downturn in user engagement on dating platforms, since many users will feel too betrayed to risk trusting dating apps for quite a while.