72% of Gen Z Says It Wants Marriage; Match Rebuilds Upward Around That Number

Match Group rebuilt its dating app Upward around a single figure from its own research: 72 percent of Gen Z respondents in the 2026 Singles in America study said they want to get married. The app, which first appeared in 2020 for Christian singles, relaunched last month with a wider brief covering young people who hold traditional views on family, faith and community, whether or not faith leads their profile. Match Group says the survey drew on 5,000 unmarried US singles and is demographically representative of Census data.

The shift began with the app's original 2020 launch as a platform for Christian daters. Match Group then moved to broaden the audience, adding a Faith Statement field that asks users to describe what they value about their relationship to God rather than requiring faith as an entry condition. Lauren DeFord, Match's director of brand marketing, described the change as a "brand shift" aimed at people "who share those same goals, but may not lead with a faith-first mindset," while saying Christian singles remain central to Upward's purpose. A second figure from the same study, that a quarter of singles aged 18 to 34 hold traditional views on family, faith and community, informed the relaunch. The app relaunched last month.

Two features arrived with the relaunch. Chivalry Mode prompts men to send the first message, a pattern Bble used in its earlier format. Marriage Timeline lets users state when they expect to marry. Upward runs on paid tiers and uses left and right swipes in the manner of Tinder. The rollout carried Western imagery: a video showed a married man named Zach in a cowboy hat and jeans gifting flowers and opening a car door, with the words "chivalrymaxxing" across the frame. Match Group calls the branding "Americana" and titles the campaign "Wanted: For Life."

Daniel Cox, who directs the Survey Center on American Life and wrote Generation Uncoupled, disputes the premise. He points to an American Institute for Boys and Men finding that 44 percent of Gen Z men reported no relationship experience during their teen years, twice the rate for older men, and argues that declines in social and civic participation have produced a "hyperindividualistic culture" where marriage is not a priority. Cox calls the trad trend "a reaction to the lack of cultural norms around courtship" and says young daters want "a script," though he adds the trad version "is not close to ideal for a lot of young people." He also cautions that Match's figure may reflect age composition, since older cohorts have already married or divorced.

Other surveys point elsewhere. A 2023 Pew Research study found 23 percent of adults called marriage "extremely" or "very important" to a fulfilling life against 61 percent for close friendships. The share of high school seniors expecting to marry someday fell from 80 percent in 1993 to 67 percent in 2023. Cox says some young women increasingly believe marriage makes them less happy.

Early use has divided. Adreanna Pulliam, a 25-year-old opera singer in Bloomington, Indiana, who has always treated marriage as "the end goal," said she encountered "MAGA types of men" in a "red-pill, trad wife, conservative values" mold alongside a profile photo taken at a funeral. She questioned why the app lists body types such as "chubby," permits married users, and offers "it's complicated" as a relationship option. Tauti, a social work student in California, quit within 48 hours and said on TikTok the experience "turned me off from Christian dating altogether." Heidi Marais, a teacher and single mother, asked why agnostics can join. Pulliam said the app might work "within communities of Christian private universities" but added, "the only way that the app works is for maybe someone who has a little bit more of a closed mind."

Match Group has not released active user counts for Upward. The App Store record includes complaints about functionality, filtering, user support and automatic bans; one reviewer called it "janky as hell." Upward declined to provide user numbers.