The pandemic accelerated mobile trends by years, and these changes should stick even as the pandemic wanes. Many people were forced to use apps for food delivery, finance, fitness, and shopping, and they’ve become accustomed to these new behaviors. Even app categories that were hurt during the pandemic, such as travel or dating apps, have been resilient. People have acclimated to new forms of mobile shopping and activities, and they’ll be more willing to try mobile interfaces for other activities going forward.

Dating apps also followed surprising patterns. Many dating app users pivoted fairly quickly to a new reality. “We did see dating apps were surprisingly resilient during the pandemic,” Sydow said. "That was really interesting from the perspectives of both weekly active users and time spent.”. Analyst Take.

On today's episode, we discuss what "going back to the office" may actually mean, the dawn of “tiered-access journalism,” video safe havens for brands, possible surges in travel plans, Facebook's new video speed dating app called Sparked, why the Rubik's Cube was invented, and more. Tune in to listen to the discussion with eMarketer principal analysts Jillian Ryan and Jeremy Goldman, and analyst at Insider Intelligence Blake Droesch.

The outage also had a serious impact on Delta flights, Disney theme parks (guests could not check in online), day traders (Robinhood and Coinbase were offline), as well as dating app Tinder. A bad software update in June took out content delivery network Fastly and resulted in a global outage that took out CNN, The New York Times, Bloomberg, and Reddit.

Dating apps are seeing an influx of new users as many continue to shelter in place. This year, we forecast there will be 26.6 million smartphone dating app users, according to our latest estimates. That’s an 18.4% increase from 2019.

Facebook Dating launched in the US last week, giving users ages 18 and older access to typical dating app features like specialized profiles and matchmaking algorithms. Though the dating app space is crowded, Facebook has an opportunity to set itself apart by simplifying what's arguably the most vexing aspect of online dating: setting up a profile.

We recently spoke with Pittson about creating buzz for a brand, gaining retail distribution, Quip's brief stint on dating apps, and more. Why do you think Quip has been successful? One of the first things that comes to mind for me is the product itself—the hero product of the electric toothbrush being genuinely category disrupting. Quip wasn't a pure marketing or brand play.

Facebook Dating. In October, Facebook launched its dating service, Facebook Dating, in Europe. The service has been available in the US since September 2019. Marketer Takeaway: The dating app space is less crowded in Europe than it is in the US, which is likely what Facebook is banking on with the rollout.

We recently sat down with Hank Izzo, vice president of marketing at Mars Wrigley US, who spoke about Sweet ReTREAT (the brand’s Valentine’s Day pop-up in New York City), why the company teamed up with dating app Bumble on this activation, and how its efforts continually evolve as the holiday shifts from romance to celebration. This is the third year you're doing a pop-up around Valentine’s Day.

eMarketer principal analyst Mark Dolliver and vice president of research Jennifer Pearson discuss the wonderful world of online dating. Who's on which platforms? What do people like and dislike about it? They then talk about Valentine's Day spending, "OK Boomer" age discrimination and the link between smartphones and mental health.

eMarketer principal analyst Debra Aho Williamson and junior analyst Blake Droesch discuss TikTok's US image, whether competitors can copy it out of business and how in-app buying will affect the platform. Then they talk about the ANA Influencer Marketing Conference, why Facebook is introducing Stories to its dating service and whether Americans will miss seeing Instagram likes when they go away.

Many mobile app categories saw a boost last year as more consumers spent time with their devices during quarantines. According to our estimates for smartphone app user growth, grocery apps, food delivery apps, and health/fitness apps were the three fastest-growing categories in 2020.