Indian dating app Betterhalf has been included in prestigious startup accelerator Y Combinator’s Winter 2021 batch.
The platform is advertised as “Match.com for 100m Indians” and is targeted at urban singles who want to find their own relationships, without their parents getting involved or traditional matrimony services.
Using two-minute personality quizzes and 16 behavioural traits, the AI matches couples who share similar thoughts or have complimentary ideologies.
Co-founder Pawan Gupta recalled his past difficulties finding a wife through the traditional means by saying: “There were several rejections from prospective families and matches. Even I rejected a few women I met. The compatibility factor was missing.
“I was exhausted emotionally and at one point, I felt like stopping this entire thing of seeking a partner.”
This inspired him to create his own dating app in 2016, where he ultimately found his wife who he married at the end of last year.
Betterhalf currently has over 500,000 verified users and claims to have made more than 25,000 relationships. It counts former Google India MD Shailesh Rao, Tribe Capital and Nurture Ventures among its other investors.
Y Combinator previously assisted ‘muzmatch’, one of the world’s biggest dating apps for Muslims, in 2017. This was followed by ‘Waves’ in 2019, a safe space for people to be open about their sexuality and connect over their fantasies and fetishes.
Visit the Betterhalf website here.