It sounds like the plot of a sci-fi rom-com: Dating app users create avatars of themselves that then go on dates in virtual reality. If the avatars hit it off, an in-person meeting is arranged.
But this isn’t “You’ve Got Mail 2.0.” This is Volar Dating.
“The whole idea is we skip a whole lot of the icebreaker stage,” Volar co-founder Ben Chiang told The Washington Times in an interview. “We call it starting on the second date, rather than the first.”
More than 2,000 users have traded thousands of messages on the date-making app since his team of former Google and Snapchat engineers launched a trial version last month in Austin, Texas, Mr. Chiang said.
The 38-year-old software engineer said his personal frustration with other dating apps served as a springboard for the creation of Volar: He spent hours swiping through profiles and composing repetitive icebreaker messages, only to wait weeks to hear back from potential matches.
By comparison, Volar simulates three daily conversations of up to 10 messages each. Over the past month, most users have “taken over” a conversation from the artificial intelligence within days of signing up, and several have started dating in person, Mr. Chiang said.
“Some people say it feels weird, but they keep using it,” he said. “The AI is very good at taking over repetitive tasks, like introductions, which are painful and demoralizing.”
Based in Los Angeles, Mr. Chiang first “matched” with his fiancée on the dating app Hinge in November 2020. But they didn’t meet in person for two months — a frustration that inspired him to dream of an app in which avatars “date” each other.
Volar adapts the technology of ChatGPT to create its AI versions of each date seeker. Unleashed to date each other, the avatars send transcripts of their conversations to their human users to assume control, reject or ignore.
Signing up requires users to verify their phone numbers, upload photographs and “chat” with an AI assistant. The process takes about five minutes.
After users answer basic questions about their interests and personality, Volar creates their avatars, which the AI updates as it learns more about each person.
Mr. Chiang said 70% of those who have downloaded the app “are still using it on the second day,” compared to a next-day user retention rate of around 10% for most apps.
He chalks that up to the AI’s laser focus on the primary interests of each user, ranging from pickleball to career advancement.
The technology doesn’t copy each user perfectly, however.
Volar faces the same problem as ChatGPT in adding false information to some AI first dates. For example, Mr. Chiang said one user complained that her avatar used her interest in video games to claim that she enjoys playing Warhammer, a war-games simulation she dislikes.
“We call them ‘hallucinations,’ where the AI model inserts something that isn’t accurate,” Mr. Chiang said. “But it’s low stakes and you can correct the AI or mention it in the request you send to the other user to take over the conversation.”
In his interview with The Washington Times, Mr. Chiang shared screenshots of a conversation between his avatar and that of a 27-year-old woman.
After exchanging greetings, Mr. Chiang’s avatar said: “So, what’s your story?”
“Hmm, my story?” the woman’s avatar replied, adding a “thinking-face” emoji. “Let’s see … I live here in Austin, and I’m pretty into creating things. Like, I absolutely love the process of nurturing an idea and seeing it come to life.”
“Oh, wow! Sound[s] like you might enjoy tinkering with stuff,” Mr. Chiang’s avatar responded. “Are you more into arts or tech?”
While Volar is free and has no limits on messaging, its creators hope to make billions of dollars a year. Mr. Chiang said they have raised $2 million from venture capitalists who believe in that possibility.
The app’s only revenue comes from selling “boosts” that put a user’s message at the top of someone else’s list of requests to chat. Volar charges $5 per boost, $10 for a month of weekly boosts or $15 for five boosts.
Volar will launch in other cities this month — including Washington, D.C., all of Texas and the rest of the South — as part of a phased national rollout building on word-of-mouth.
Mr. Chiang, who helped design My AI for Snapchat and once served as head of global data for Uber, said he is targeting metropolitan areas with critical masses of people in their 30s looking for “serious relationships.”
And he has a suggestion for any online daters who fear AI taking over their lives in techno-thriller fashion: Give Volar a try to “see how they like it.”
“We could crash and burn, but we think this works because people are using it,” Mr. Chiang said. “This is not a replacement for human interaction, it’s just an assistant.”