Jack’d has announced it will be staying free, despite recent reports to the contrary.
A Bloomberg article stated that the gay dating app would be following products like Hinge by introducing a subscription service.
However, its parent company Online Buddies recently confirmed that this wasn’t the case, and the app would remain free.
Phil Henricks, VP of Strategy and Business Development at Online Buddies said: “Our research continues to show that our targeted demographic does not pay for music, games, movies, or dating.
“They’ve been raised to expect that digital products are free and they don’t see any reason to start paying for them now.”
Instead, the company will continue to push advertising onto the platform, which accounts for over 60% of its revenue.
Jack’d was bought by Online Buddies in 2013, when it had 5m members since launching in 2010, and was seeing 10,000 installs a day.
Around 67% of the app’s members are between the ages of 18 and 26, and 60% are black and latino.
Created by Yosuke Matsuda from Lucid Dreams, the app has a huge community of users, and employs a location-based service, along with extensive profile filtering — allowing men to choose what “scene” they are looking for.
Find out more about the app here.