Lexicon ·
dating for the plot
noun phrase, from the bio line “everything I do is for the plot”
- Stated meaning
- Going on dates for the experience and the story to tell afterwards, without needing them to lead anywhere.
- Operating meaning
- Every date filed as material, so that one that goes nowhere is still booked as a gain and the question of what either party wanted never comes due.
- Origin
- Named by Tinder in its Year in Swipe release of December 2023 as one of the year's top dating trends, from a phrase the release says was rising in its users' bios. The figure for those bios is Tinder's own, and the record holds no count of the phrase by anyone else.
- Antonyms
- intentional dating
Tinder named it one of the 2 top dating trends of 2023 in its Year in Swipe release (opens in a new window) that December. Dating for the plot, the release said, “denotes that dating was more about the journey and less about ‘the end’ in 2023.” Singles met new people “to have new experiences and fun stories to tell, rather than taking a traditional goal-oriented approach.” The evidence was the bios. Tinder reported “a 5.5x increase in users using the term in bios,” from bio data covering the first 9 months of 2023, and printed an example: “Everything I do is for the plot, let’s make some memories.” The release does not say what the 5.5 was multiplied from.
The phrase kept its value longer than the trend did. A year later Tinder’s next release (opens in a new window) closed the chapter: “Last year was all about being the main character, living for the plot. This year, we’re in the director’s chair.” In September 2025 Plenty of Fish (opens in a new window) issued the same behaviour under a coinage of its own, love-loreing, defined as dating “for the plot,” and reported that 37% of singles had “gone on a date just to see where the story leads.”
Under load, the frame changes the books and leaves the evening as it was. A date that leads nowhere is entered as material, so every date shows a return and none shows a loss. The one question it settles in advance is what either party wanted, by making it unnecessary to ask. When both people at the table are dating for the plot, each is a minor character in the other’s, and 2 stories are being written about 1 dinner with nobody assigned to the ending.