Zach Thal was fed up with swiping. The 34-year-old Seattle attorney had been on and off the dating apps for years, and he felt like the experience was getting less and less satisfying. He took a break from dating altogether. When he was finally ready to give finding love another shot, he took a new approach.

“ When I decided I wanted to start getting back into it, I went to the matchmaker thing instead,” Thal said. “And also I’ve started going to social events and meeting people organically — trying to, at least. But no, I haven’t been back on the apps.”

Thal hired Monique Le, a Seattle-based matchmaker. Le spent time getting to know him, what he’s looking for, and his dealbreakers, so she could sort through her database of potential matches and set him up.

And Thal isn’t alone. An epidemic of dating app fatigue has more people exploring matchmaking, turning one of the world’s oldest professions into the hot new thing.

“I feel like my volume doubled during COVID. And then after that, there’s a trend of continued demand,” Le said.

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Matchmakers see Seattle as a market with a lot of opportunity. It has a high concentration of well-paid professionals, and a reputation for being full of chilly introverts. It’s also, increasingly, a city of singles. More than a quarter of Seattle’s adults live alone, the fifth-highest rate of any city in the U.S. And about half of the men living in Seattle have never been married. It’s part of a national trend that some are calling a “relationship recession.”

“I get quite a few doctors,” Le said. “I also get some lawyers … tech and engineers, just the nature of Seattle — Amazon, Facebook, Microsoft, Boeing. Lots of people from the tech industry come to me.”

And Le isn’t the only game in town. Three Day Rule is a fully remote matchmaking service with about 90 matchmakers across the country, and it more than tripled its Seattle clients last year.

“We are definitely seeing a younger generation moving away from dating apps, such as Tinder, Bumble, Hinge, sort of that swipe culture,” said Lacy Boney, a VIP matchmaker with Three Day Rule who works with clients in the Pacific Northwest. “I’ve really noticed a burnout. There’s definitely a dating app burnout, and I have seen an absolute uprise in matchmaking.”

Three Day Rule CEO Adam Cohen-Aslatei said gone are the days when matchmaking was primarily for clients in middle age. The company is seeing more people in their 30s and even 20s trying it.

“The whole industry is seeing tremendous growth ... Our industry is growing about between 14 and 20% per year,” he said. “The dating app industry is shrinking in the U.S.”

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The companies behind those dating apps are trying to cash in on the matchmaking trend. The founder of Hinge is launching a matchmaking startup. Bumble is planning to launch a matchmaking service. But those companies aren’t recruiting armies of human matchmakers, they’re using AI to set people up.

Cohen Aslatei said AI might be able to coach singles into becoming better daters but, “the only data they have is on user behavior on the app. The uniqueness of matchmaking is that we go to our clients and our matches after the date, and we ask you why it worked and why it didn’t. We get post-date feedback. We take all that feedback, and we quantify that internally to provide you your next match. Dating apps don’t have that information, so how are they going to know what leads to a successful relationship?”

Matchmaking may be on the rise, but the price tag is likely to sort out singles prone to sticker shock. Three Day Rule’s three-month premium package starts at $6,300. Le, the self-employed matchmaker, prices based on how long she expects it will take to match her client.

“I have charged as much as $50,000, but I also charge as little as $7,500, depending on the complexity and the market’s demand,” she said.

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It’s more than many people are willing to spend, but Aslatei said clients should consider the time commitment and success rate of matchmaking compared to other dating services. He says matchmaking leads to a relationship 70-80% of the time.

Still, there are cheaper alternatives for singles unwilling to shell out thousands of dollars to find a partner. Most matchmakers allow people to join their database of potential suitors for free or a nominal fee. It’s no guarantee, but if the matchmaker has a client they think would be a good match, the pool applicant will be set up.

Dating app disillusionment is also driving a surge in in-person singles events. Several Seattle bars host singles nights, speed dating, and other ways to help people connect in real life.

Sara Rosenblad hosts the Seattle chapter of the popular “Pitch-A-Friend” event, in which friends give a short PowerPoint presentation advertising a single catch in their lives.

“We do get quite crowded,” she said ahead of a recent event at Victor Tavern in Eastlake. “We have nine to 10 pitch spots per event, and a lot of times those fill up. For today I have 11 people pitching and seven people on the wait list.”

Pitch-A-Friend is a Philadelphia-based company that set up an outpost in Seattle last November. The event is free and draws such big crowds that venues pay the company to bring in customers.

Twenty-nine-year-old Gaea Turman let her friends convince her to be pitched. She was nervous but had enough dating app fatigue that she was willing to take a risk on something new.

“I think it’ll be fun,” she said before the event started. “It’s deeply anxiety-inducing, and I intend to be very inebriated by the time my slides come around. But I think it’ll be a good time, and a good growth experience. How often do you get to see a PowerPoint where you’re the subject?”

The event was standing room only by the time pitches began.

“People enjoy the event enough to come again and again, and it’s very effective,” Rosenblad said. “People are actually meeting people, making friends, making romantic partners. There’s definitely a demand for it.”

Monica Nickelsburg is a reporter with KUOW. This story comes to you from the Northwest News Network, a collaboration between public media organizations in Oregon and Washington.

It is part of OPB’s broader effort to ensure that everyone in our region has access to quality journalism that informs, entertains and enriches their lives. To learn more, visit our journalism partnerships page.

News Source : https://www.opb.org/article/2026/08/02/seattle-booming-matchmaking-industry/