Transgender people have long said that Tinder wasn’t inclusive to them, that they were being harassed, that they were often reported and blocked, that by being unable to identify as something more than male or female was frustrating to them and their matches. Well, Tinder listened.
As of yesterday, Tinder users can express their gender in 37 different ways on the dating app using auto-fill terms—from transgender to trans woman to gender queer to pansexual. “No one will ever be banned from Tinder because of their gender,” the company writes on its blog. “We haven’t had the right tools to serve our diverse community in the past, but that changes today.”
Members can get there by tapping “I Am” and selecting “More,” after which there is a prompt to write in their gender. They can also choose to display their gender or not on their profile.
Screengrab via blog.gotinder.com
In designing the update, Tinder put together a team of activists from GLAAD and the LGBTQ community. Tinder also says it is combatting harassment against trans people by installing harassment detection tools and educating its staff and support team on the challenges the trans community faces.
Learn more about Tinder’s move toward trans inclusion in the video below.
