Think AAPI men don’t do well on dating apps? New data says otherwise 👍

Finding yourself in a space where you feel discounted, unheard, or even outright unwanted is unfortunately a scenario many singles have faced in online dating — particularly Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) men.

For years, the lack of realistic representation in pop culture combined with stereotypes painting AAPI men as undesirable cultivated an online dating scene where these men not only felt invisible but actually had fewer opportunities to find love. You can see these very real consequences reflected in data famously published by a dating app in 2014 showing that Asian men on their platform were rated the lowest out of all of the ethnicities.

Coffee Meets Bagel’s mission is to give everyone a chance at love, no matter where you come from or what you look like. But our foundation is firmly rooted in the AAPI community, and we might not even be who we are today without their support — within the first two years of CMB’s inception, AAPI daters made up the majority of our user base.

And maybe even more than that, we’re a dating app founded by three Korean sisters who know what it’s like to enter a space that isn’t necessarily stacked in your favor — after all, the quintessential entrepreneur in most heads tends to look more like the Mark Zuckerbergs of the world.

So, 10 years after that infamous data came to light, we find ourselves wanting to rewrite the narrative.

Then and now: How AAPI men perform on dating apps

In honor of Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month, we did some digging of our own into dating app trends to see if any progress has been made for AAPI men in the last decade. What we found was promising: Our data shows that AAPI men now rank better in 2024, at least on CMB, compared to the other dating app’s data from 2014.

So, how did we arrive at this conclusion? First, it’s worth noting that while we don’t know the precise methodology the other dating app employed for their analysis, we compared the ratings from different ethnicity-gender combinations to come up with a ranking to make the comparison a bit simpler.

Looking at the chart above, you can see the ranking using our data on the right compared to the other app’s on the left. Our ranking was determined by like rates (how many likes one person sends compared to how many people they see) among women of different ethnicities: AAPI, Black, Latina, and White women, the same used in the other dating app’s study. So basically, if AAPI women saw 100 AAPI men, how many of them did they like? Then the same process was repeated for the other ethnicities.

Again, we want to emphasize that this isn’t an apples-to-apples comparison to the previous study, as there are a couple of fundamental differences between CMB and the other dating app.

On top of us likely using a more straightforward methodology, our user-base composition is probably different. CMB has a high number of AAPI daters, much more than the national population as a percentage. And since we can’t take a peek at their user base, we can only assume how it breaks down.

In addition to seeing how AAPI men rank among women of different ethnicities, we also took a look at how many likes men from different ethnicities get in total. We found that AAPI men got the largest share of likes from women, regardless of the woman’s ethnicity.

Again, CMB’s demographics do skew towards having more Asian men — so naturally if there are more people in one group, they’ll tend to get more likes. However, even when we normalize the data for the size of the active user base of each ethnic group, the conclusion is still the same with AAPI men receiving the most likes. Keep in mind though that just because AAPI men get a larger like-share, that doesn’t necessarily mean they’re more likely to be liked.

Still, this trend shows progress and signals a significant shift in how AAPI men are received in the dating world.

The changing landscape of online dating

While it’s hard to pin down exactly what’s changed in the last 10 years to help AAPI men perform better on dating apps, we have a few theories.

First, it’s possible that cross-ethnicity dating is much more common now than it was in 2014. In fact, we’re seeing an all-time high of daters matching with people outside of their own ethnicities on CMB.

Our algorithm doesn’t take ethnicity into account when suggesting profiles we think would be a good match. The only exception is when a dater uses their Preferences for Suggested or filters in Discover to limit their options. So as long as our daters aren’t saying otherwise, they might see a wider dating pool than they typically would when dating offline.

Another theory? CMB Daters are looking for an actual, serious relationship (we are the dating app for serious daters, after all) and AAPI men are rising to the occasion.

We found a few points to back up that claim: AAPI men are not only 18% more likely to indicate they’re ready for something serious on their profile, but they also seem to put in more effort overall. They’re on the app 25% more and send 10% more messages on average. Sounds like serious-relationship material, if you ask us.

And lastly, a lot has changed in the mainstream culture over the years. From K-pop dominating the music scene to Buldak ramen hauls on TikTok to smash-hits like “Everything Everywhere All at Once,” AAPI culture isn’t just being included in the pop-culture discussion — it’s shaping the discussion.

Representation in Hollywood has changed, too. We’re seeing the definition of a leading man evolve — Simu Liu starred as Shang-Chi in a major Marvel blockbuster, solidifying his place in what is arguably the biggest franchise in movie history. Also, one study shows that the percentage of Asian characters with speaking roles jumped from around 3% to nearly 16% in the last 15 years.

Of course, that’s only one part of the bigger picture and we still have a long way to go in terms of representation — and authentic representation at that. For example, did you know only one AAPI man has won an Academy Award for Best Actor? Or that 2023 was the first year four AAPI actors, both men and women, were nominated at the same time? Not won, but simply nominated.

But overall, it’s possible that this cultural shift has helped AAPI men when it comes to dating.

How CMB is supporting AAPI daters this month and beyond

For too long, AAPI men have had to navigate dating (which is already stressful enough on its own!) with the narrative that they’re not desirable hanging over their heads. And unfortunately, this old data showing AAPI men performing poorly on dating apps has lived on, adding to the claim.

Our hope? Our new data showing that AAPI men are not only performing better but thriving on CMB will help put those old, damaging stereotypes to rest.

We want all of our daters to feel safe and wanted throughout their journey to find love. And maybe even more importantly, we want CMB Daters to feel proud of their identity and know that simply being themselves is the very best thing they can do.

And we know that the AAPI community isn’t a monolith. That’s why daters have the opportunity to highlight their ethnicity on their CMB profile, whether that’s Asian, East Asian, South Asian, Southeast Asian, or Pacific Islander. Want to get a little more specific? Daters can simply write in the ethnicity they’d like shown on their profile, like Korean or Filipino.

Outside of the app, we’re continuing to do everything we can to support the AAPI community. We’re sponsoring AAPI-centric events, like Project by Project, Wharton Asian American Association of MBAs, and Dear Community. We’re also a proud partner with Gold House, a non-profit that celebrates AAPI excellence.

Coffee Meets Bagel is here to help you find a serious relationship — but we’re also here to help you find love, and that means both loving someone else and loving yourself. So, whether you’re an AAPI dater on CMB, on a different dating app, or just here for the ride, we hope we’ve inspired you to have the confidence to go forth and be unabashedly, wholeheartedly, yourself. Because you’re a catch.