Dating apps got boring.

The average person sends hundreds of likes a year on dating apps. Most of them lead nowhere. The matches that do happen often feel flat by the time you meet — because the version of someone in their profile rarely matches the person across the table.

Photos can be five years old. Bios can be ghostwritten. Prompts can be borrowed. And after enough cycles of this, dating apps stop feeling like dating and start feeling like work.

78% of dating app users report burnout. The number gets worse every year.

Video shows what photos can't. Tone. Humor. Confidence. Awkwardness. The little things that make someone feel real.

When your profile is a short video, you can't hide behind filters. You can't pretend to be someone you're not. You're either the kind of person someone wants to meet or you're not — and either way, that's useful information for everyone.

But video alone isn't enough. The reason swiping feels empty is that it takes zero effort. A tap means nothing. So we built Vreel around a single mechanic: if you want to match with someone, you have to record a short video back.

That changes everything downstream. Fewer drive-by likes. Better first messages. Real personality from the first interaction. The match starts mid-conversation instead of at zero.

NYC is the hardest dating market in the country and the densest. If Vreel works here, it works anywhere. We're starting small on purpose — a tight community where the experience feels right before we open it up.

We're building Vreel slowly and on purpose. We'd rather have a small community of people who actually meet each other than a massive user base that doesn't.

If that sounds like the kind of dating app you've been waiting for, apply at vreel.app.