Study: These 10 Cities Search Tinder Most

Tinder forever changed the dating scene when it launched in September 2012. The dating app pioneered a swiping system that encourages singles to treat love like a game of Hot or Not. And it has blown up.

Within a year of its launch, Tinder was processing over 350 million swipes and over 4 million matches per day. Within two years, it was processing over a billion swipes per day and had nearly 50 million active users.¹

Today, swiping culture continues to thrive, and Tinder has created over 97 billion matches in 190 countries worldwide.

We decided to dig deeper into those impressive numbers and find out which U.S. cities have some of the most active and enthusiastic Tinder users.

According to Google Trends, Eugene, Oregon has the distinction of being the most Tinder-friendly city in the U.S. This gorgeous college town on the Willamette River is known for its breathtaking nature, local music scene, and young singles from the University of Oregon looking to date.²

Whether you’re an avid athlete, a tech wiz, or a college sports fan, you can find Tinder dates in Eugene who share your hobbies and interests. Eugene singles are bright and looking for someone to share the many beauties of the Northwest with.

Tempe is home to Arizona State University, which is one of the largest public colleges in the country in terms of overall enrollment numbers.³ In fall 2016, ASU enrolled nearly 72,000 students who took classes on its metro campuses.⁴

Our Google Trends assessment of these students’ search histories revealed they’re interested in hitting up a date while hitting the books.

The median age in Tempe is 29.9, which is ripe marrying age. Arizona’s average marrying age is 28.4.⁵ A lot of people assume Tinder is only useful for short-term hookups and casual dating, but a 2017 survey revealed that Tinder users between 18 and 36 are more likely to be looking for a committed relationship than are offline daters.⁶

Singles in Anchorage are active on Tinder, though it may not be for the same reasons as the singles of Eugene or Tempe. Unlike avid college online daters, Anchorage-based Tinder users may be looking more for a partner to snuggle up with during Alaska winters than a date to their frat formal.

And while Anchorage itself is a bit more even, Alaska as a whole has a more uneven men-to-women gender split than anywhere in the country, with 109.2 men for every 100 women.⁷

Given that Tinder is already overwhelmingly dominated by men, we can only imagine that Anchorage Tinder’s gender breakdown might be skewed, to say the least.

Still, Anchorage is a thriving large city, and with the wonders of the Alaskan wilderness in your backyard, Anchorage singles have plenty of great date options.

For young professionals in the West, Reno has become an underrated gem. Many Californians and Nevadans flocked to Reno for its natural beauty nestled in the Sierra Nevada,⁸ as well as its growing job market and relatively low housing costs.

But with an average age of 37.3, people come to Reno young, meaning that many of its residents are actively dating.

Reno is particularly friendly for Tinder. And while Reno itself is a large city, the areas surrounding it are not particularly urban, making Tinder a great option for singles in the wider Reno area unsure of how to meet someone.

Madison is home to the Wisconsin State Capitol Building, the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and over 280,000 residents. The city is the second most populous city in Wisconsin, and it has the second most active Tinder user base in the Midwest.

Madison scored a 75 on Google Trends’ 100-point scale of Tinder searches.

Young and single Wisconsin Badgers are likely driving Tinder’s local popularity. While the city’s median age is a respectable 31.8, Mad Town (as the kids call it) is home to a sizable young population at the university. UW-Madison is home to over 52,000 students.⁹

When not hitting the books, many of these students are online hitting up local dates.

Fort Collins may seem stuck in the past with its Old Town district,¹⁰ vintage trolley, and history exhibits, but its residents are almost as tech-savvy and date-friendly as Berkeley students. The Colorado city actually sees the second-highest number of Tinder searches on Google.

It scored an 83 out of 100, which means a high concentration of singles are searching for a dating app to upgrade their love lives.

As the fourth most populous city in Colorado, Fort Collins supports a thriving urban population, including many students enrolled at Colorado State University or Front Range Community College. These universities help keep Fort Collins young.

The majority of Fort Collins residents are under 45 years old. 

According to the census, 22.1% of residents are between 18 and 24 years old,¹¹ and 31.5% are between 25 and 44 years old. The median age is 29.3, which is significantly younger than Colorado’s median age of 37.5.¹²

Some over-30 singles took to Reddit to complain about a lack of dating options in Fort Collins, but one person chimed in with some helpful words of wisdom: “There are attractive women everywhere. If you’re not a creep, I don’t see why you would have a problem.”

Yet another college town (Are you seeing the pattern yet?), Lexington is the second-most populous city in Kentucky and the best one for online daters. Lexington is home to the University of Kentucky,¹³ a competitive university with about 36,000 students, many of whom are active on Tinder.

Like much of Kentucky, Lexington has a huge presence in the horse world, meaning that many of its residents breed, ride, and care for horses.¹⁴

Horse-workers are often young and frequently move around seasonally, which may contribute to their need to meet shorter-term partners on dating apps like Tinder.

But if you’re interested in horses, Lexington Tinder is a great place to meet your next riding buddy!

Illinois singles may find the best city life in Chicago, but they’ll likely enjoy the most success on Tinder in Springfield. Springfield is most famous for being the home turf of President Abraham Lincoln, and today it continues that political legacy as Illinois’s state capital. 

Many young Illinois-based political workers relocate to Springfield, where their options for meeting new romantic partners are largely online. Springfield is also home to several small universities, populating this small city of just about 112,000 with plenty of those active college daters.

If you’re looking for Tinder date ideas in Springfield, consider taking your date out to try one of the city’s signature horseshoe sandwiches. As one Reddit user responded when asked for Springfield date ideas: “Get her the right horseshoe and the rest of the night will take care of itself.”¹⁵

Singles flock to Boise for its gorgeous Idaho nature and thriving tech scene. But once they arrive, they start looking for the missing piece: romance. With a median age of 38.2 and Boise State University in its bounds, Boise is full of young people active on Tinder.

While Boise singles are on Tinder, they may be more serious about finding a relationship than in other areas. According to one source, 16% of Boise residents are members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS),¹⁶ which encourages more traditional dating practices.

Still, many Boise singles are not religious, so there’s someone compatible for everyone.

Rounding out our list of Tinder-active cities is Spokane. This Eastern Washington city has a wonderful natural landscape, with plenty of options for hiking-based dates and exploring the outdoors.

However, Spokane singles have mixed feelings about the dating scene and what drives them to Tinder. Said one Spokane Reddit user:

“The odds are good, but the goods are odd.”

Not everyone has bad dating experiences, though. One user shared that in their experience, Spokane singles can meet their dating goals.

“My religious female friends who used Tinder are all married now (which was their goal) and my friends who are just looking to date have found plenty of folks to date through online dating (they’ve had a lot of bad dates but I think that just comes with the territory). My roommates are polyamorous and don’t seem to be struggling.”

No big surprise here: North Dakota consistently leads the pack in Tinder searches. Those of us in rural, sparsely populated states seem to be the most eager for romantic connection.

Alaska, Maine, and South Dakota all follow close behind, suggesting that being far away from the nearest good bar or running club may necessitate hitting the apps.

Tinder claims about 75 million monthly active users worldwide,¹⁷ and 7.8 million users in the U.S. To put that in context, the current US population is 340 million, meaning that fully 2.3% of the U.S. population are active Tinder users!

The average Tinder user is 26, and the vast majority of Tinder users are 18-34. For older adults, Tinder tends not to be the best option.

Three-quarters or 75% of users on Tinder are men, which is actually pretty close to standard for most dating apps. Women tend to be underrepresented, which often means they have more options on the apps.

We evaluated Google Trends data over the past 12 months, from May 2024 to May 2025, for the “Tinder App” and filtered the results by “cities,” including low-search volume areas, to get the highest per-capita results. Results are based on a 0–100 score rating.

Additional background information was gathered from datausa.io, Forbes, The New York Times, The U.S. Census Bureau, BestLife, World Population Review, and Census Reporter, among others. We also pulled Tinder user testimonials from Reddit discussion threads. Photos of the cities were chosen from Shutterstock’s photo collection.

1. https://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/30/fashion/tinder-the-fast-growing-dating-app-taps-an-age-old-truth.html ↩︎
2. https://www.eugenecascadescoast.org/eugene/ ↩︎
3. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_public_university_campuses_by_enrollment ↩︎
4. https://www.asu.edu/about/enrollment ↩︎
5. https://bestlifeonline.com/average-marriage-age-united-states/ ↩︎
6. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/19/style/tinder-relationship-dating-study.html ↩︎
7. https://www.statista.com/statistics/301946/us-population-males-per-100-females-by-state/ ↩︎
8. https://www.rgj.com/story/news/money/business/2025/02/14/we-have-to-grow-anyway-the-good-and-bad-of-reno-economy-2025-state-of-northern-nevada-economy/78539697007/ ↩︎
9. https://www.wisc.edu/admissions/ ↩︎
10. https://www.visitftcollins.com/maps-info/neighborhoods/old-town/ ↩︎
11. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_Collins,_Colorado#Demographics ↩︎
12. https://datausa.io/profile/geo/colorado/ ↩︎
13. https://www.uky.edu/ ↩︎
14. https://www.lexingtonky.gov/ ↩︎
15. https://www.reddit.com/r/SpringfieldIL/comments/1hjmhza/date_ideas_in_springfield/ ↩︎
16. https://purposeinchrist.com/how-mormon-is-boise/ ↩︎
17. https://www.crossrivertherapy.com/research/tinder-statistics ↩︎