GoKawiilAs Bumble gets ready for a big overhaul meant to win back Gen Z users (who are pretty over dating apps right now), its latest earnings still reports that paying users are declining. In the first quarter of 2026, total paying users fell 21.1% to 3.2 million, down from 4 million a year ago.
This has been the story for a few quarters now. However, during the call to investors this afternoon, Bumble has framed this as a deliberate shift toward higher-quality, more intentional users.
So while total revenue dropped 14.1% to $212.4 million (though it did beat expectations), and Bumble app revenue fell to $172.7 million, its total average revenue per paying user increased nearly 9%. It also reported higher profits: Net earnings increased to $52.6 million compared to $19.8 million in the year-ago quarter (largely from cutting sales and marketing expenses).
On the company’s investor call, founder and CEO Whitney Wolfe Herd described the paid-user decline as part of an intentional reset. “This is a period of real transformation at Bumble over the past few quarters,” she said. “We have executed a deliberate reset of our member base. We made a clear choice to prioritize quality over quantity, focusing on well-intentioned, engaged members. That decision reduced overall scale, but meaningfully improved the health of our ecosystem.”
Still, even with that framing, a shrinking paying user base is hard to ignore. That’s why much of the conversation on the call was more about what comes next. Bumble is asking investors to look ahead to its massive overhaul, which it hopes will eventually reverse the trend.
“When do we start to see a rebound in the numbers you’re all looking for? Well, the answer is very simple. When our technology and our next-gen recommendation engine can actually help better connect people more compatibly and show people who they want to see and out on great dates. That’s where the magic happens,” Herd said.
The overhaul refers to replacing Bumble’s old technology platform with a cloud-native, AI-powered one so it can improve matches and roll out updates more quickly. This is already starting to roll out to some users and will expand over the next few months.
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