The new dating app
Clover would be the offspring of OkCupid and Tinder if they had a one-night stand and forgot to use a condom. Launched in April 2014, Clover uses the same basic idea as Tinder — you scroll through pictures of other users and either “like” potential matches by swiping right or “dislike” them by swiping left — but Clover takes a note out of the OkCupid book and assigns a percentage to the potential match of how well you two may get along. One draw back is we couldn't figure out what this percentage is based on: Is it our love for sandwiches?
But while Tinder users can only chat with other users once they have both liked each other (and for those of you not on Tinder, you only know if someone liked you once you’ve liked them), Clover shows users everyone who's liked you, and you can chat with anyone you’d like — for a price. If you want to send a message to someone who you like but who hasn’t liked you back (yet), you have to give up several of your “Clover coins.” Clover users earn “coins” if someone they haven’t liked back yet pays to message them. According to an email from Clover’s PR director Miranda McCurlie, coins can also be used to “unlock private photos and send gifts.” We scrolled through the gifts and they're akin to emjois. We wonder what message would accompany the cactus emjoi, maybe "You made my pickle prickle when I saw your photo!"
Also unlike Tinder, Clover lets you scroll through potential matches without having to swipe left or right. It's a nice feature, because let's be honest, sometimes you just can't decide: Is it the lighting or does he/she really look like that? Another feature that we liked was is if you accidentally “swipe left” on someone you actually like, you can undo this action. Apparently “just shake your phone to undo that action and the profile will magically reappear,” adds McCurlie. On Tinder, however, all hope is lost if you “X” someone you didn’t mean to.
In other words, Tinder is like shopping for potential partners with a no-return policy, whereas Clover is more akin to browsing.
From extensive research, and by that we mean we spent a good five minutes literally “liking” everyone that popped up on our screen and then waiting for the messages to come in, it would seem that Clover users are on the whole less weird than Tinder users. The messages we got on Clover were much more of the “hello” variety and much less of the “Ccan I eat Nutella off of you?”
So if you’ve been looking for a Tinder without the weirdoes, you might want to give Clover a try. But beware of unlocking any "private photos."
