How tech is changing indigenous matchmaking

Matchmaking, long deeply embedded in Nigeria’s cultural history, has often been traditionally handled by family elders, community networks, or religious leaders as a standard for arranging long-term marriage.

With the rise in the use of smartphones between 2010 and 2013, many young Nigerians turned online for love, using general chatrooms, BlackBerry Messenger groups, and forums like Nairaland for matchmaking.

From desktop web forums and chat rooms, the evolution of digital technology led to a shift to mobile apps such as 2go, Badoo and Tinder.

Google data showed that Nigeria ranked as a global leader in searches for love and dating apps, turning digital matchmaking into a major part of modern Nigerian social life, but the limitations of the global matchmaking sites soon became apparent.

“These apps were designed by non-Nigerians and so didn’t have an understanding of how we date. They didn’t consider ethnicity, religious backgrounds or relationships with clear intentions,” a banker, Paul Nwanze, who had used various matchmaking apps, noted.

Indeed, apps like Tinder, Bumble and Hinge were built for Western markets. Some of them had subscription models which users were expected to pay for in dollars, which is a far cry from local payment habits.

The intent of most of the global apps was to foster casual hookup culture, a notion that was openly frowned upon by many Nigerians on religious and cultural grounds.

To this end, some faith-based matchmaking platforms, such as Nigerian Christian Singles, Agape Christian Singles and Wife.ng, have been designed.

Recognising the local nuances missed by many global dating apps, Nigerian developers started building tailored, indigenous platforms which skew towards users who are intentional and ready for serious relationships or marriage.

Indigenous apps unveiled

Nigeria’s first indigenous dating website and app was 4clique, which was officially launched on August 29, 2013, in Lagos.

Over the years, the local tech ecosystem saw newer iterations tailored to specific cultural nuances and modern matchmaking, such as Trueflutter and Vybe, and, more recently, culturally focused platforms like the Yetunde Yoruba dating app and MyPerson.ng.

Speaking with Sunday PUNCH, the co-founder and Chief Executive Officer of Trueflutter, Dare Olatoye, said what motivated him to develop the app started with a problem he kept seeing up close.

Before Trueflutter, he had been doing matchmaking privately, adding that he personally made over 185 matches, and around five of those couples have gone on to marry.

Doing that work taught him something the mainstream dating apps get wrong for the Nigerian community and the wider African diaspora.

“Compatibility isn’t just about attraction or a clever bio. It’s about culture, values, faith, family expectations, tribe, and where you see your life heading. The global apps flatten all of that. You end up swiping through people you’d never actually build a life with. So, the motivation was really to take what I was doing by hand, that careful, values-first matching, and build it into something that could reach thousands of people at once.

“I wanted to create a space where a Nigerian in Lagos, London, or Houston could meet someone who genuinely gets them, without having to explain their whole background from scratch. That’s why we describe Trueflutter as culturally compatible matching. It’s now Africa’s highest-rated dating app and ranked number one in Nigeria, which tells me the need was real and we weren’t the only ones frustrated by what existed,” Olatoye explained.

This move, according to the CEO, has had plenty of challenges, one of which was trust. In a country where online dating still carries stigma, many users of the homegrown app worried about safety, scams, and being judged for even being on an app.

“So, a huge part of the early work wasn’t product features; it was earning credibility, showing real couples, real stories, and proving this was a serious, respectful place to meet someone.

“The second was building for a diaspora that’s spread across continents but wants to feel like one community. Serving someone in Lagos and another person in London at the same time means thinking carefully about culture, tone, and even how we tell our story market by market, which is why our UK expansion has its own voice rather than a copy-paste of what works in Nigeria.

“And then there’s the ordinary hard stuff of running a startup: retention, fundraising, and building the right team. I’m fortunate to have strong co-founders and a technical team, but keeping people engaged in a category where the ultimate goal is for them to leave the app, because they found someone, is a genuine challenge every dating company wrestles with. We’ve been encouraged that our thirty-day retention holds up well against the industry, which suggests people are finding real value, not just scrolling,” Olatoye noted.

The CEO of Trueflutter said between his matchmaking work and the app, he has seen matches turn into serious relationships and, so far, around five marriages.

“Beyond the weddings, there’s a growing base of couples who met on Trueflutter and are building something real: dating seriously, meeting families, planning futures.

• Expert urges support, not punishment, for suicidal people
• Are Igbo men averse to divorcees and single mothers?
• Firm unveils AI platform for brand intelligence

We regularly share those success stories because they’re the truest proof the model works.

“On the numbers side, we hold a 4.7-star rating and the number one position in Nigeria, and we’re now extending that into the UK diaspora market with events, campus programmes, and community-building.

“So, the progress is on two tracks at once: the human one, real couples, real marriages; and the growth one, becoming the highest-rated app in our category and expanding internationally. For me, the two are inseparable. The marriages are what earn us the ratings and the reach, and the reach is what lets us go create more of those marriages,” Olatoye added.

An app for Yoruba singles

The changing face of matchmaking apps is not only about creating platforms tailored to the Nigerian community; it has also evolved to include apps designed for specific ethnic groups, such as the Yoruba.

Officially unveiled earlier this year, Yetunde, a Yoruba dating app, was created specifically to connect Yoruba singles around the world.

The co-founder and Chief Technology Officer of the Yetunde app, Ifeoluwa Olugbemi, told Sunday PUNCH that technology has made it easier than ever to meet people, but harder than ever to meet the right ones.

He noted that the big platforms optimise for volume and often treat culture as a filter that users tick, instead of treating it as the foundation of a relationship.

“For the Yoruba community, that is a real gap. We are not a small group. We are in Lagos and Ibadan, but also in London, Houston, Salvador da Bahia, Havana, Port of Spain, Cotonou. What connects us is not geography; it is language, values, family, and how we understand commitment. Yet no platform was built around that.

“Yetunde exists to change that. We built it so that someone in the diaspora can meet a partner who already understands what ìwà (character) means, who will greet a mother-in-law properly, and who shares the same picture of what a home looks like. Indigenous does not mean old-fashioned. It means we start from who our people actually are,” Olugbemi said.

To shore up public trust, the CTO clarified that verification is not optional on the app, emphasising that there are no unverified users on the platform.

“Every single member has proven their identity before they can see or speak to anyone. We do that in layers. Members verify with a government-issued identity, including their National Identification Number through NIMC. They then take a live photo inside the app, at that moment.

“We do not accept a picture uploaded from a phone’s gallery, because that is exactly how impersonation and AI-generated fakes get in. We match that live capture against the identity document, and the name a member displays is locked to what their identity confirms.

“Just as importantly, we do not hoard that data. Verification images are not stored long-term. We verify, and then we let go. Trust is the product. If people cannot believe who they are talking to, nothing else we build matters,” Olugbemi added.

‘Singles can filter for the right match’

A Nigerian tech entrepreneur and digital creator, Ichie John, had observed that most dating apps used in the country were not really built with Nigerians in mind.

He noticed that these apps do not reflect the collective culture, humour, tribe, faith and family approval that genuinely matter when it comes to who we connect with. This motivated him to create a dating app, MyPerson.ng.

Speaking with Sunday PUNCH, John said, “I wanted to build something Nigerians could call their own. The platform helps Nigerian singles discover people they can genuinely connect with. Users can filter matches by tribe, state and religion, whether Christian, Muslim or Traditional, because those things shape compatibility for a lot of people here.

“Beyond swiping and matching, we built in community features like confessions and stories, so people can express themselves and connect in more ways than just chat. Users can also go on audio and video calls, send gifts, and even play games together with their match, which makes getting to know someone feel less pressured and more natural.”

However, the digital journey has been one that came with some challenges in terms of user authenticity and experience.

“Trust is the hardest thing to get right in online dating. Fake profiles can ruin the experience for everyone, so we’ve had to put real effort into keeping the platform genuine and safe. On the experience side, a lot of our users are on lower-end phones with unstable internet, so we have had to prioritise speed and reliability over flashy features.

“Building this taught me that a dating platform isn’t just about the technology; it’s about understanding how people actually behave and designing around that,” John added.