Breeze Dating App Review After 2 Dates (NYC)

I got Instagram ads for a dating app called Breeze Social, and I was intrigued by the concept: no chatting, just go directly on a date if you match.

I’d started using the apps for the first time in my life a few months prior—end of a long relationship that took up the majority of my twenties—and I was already tired of the pleasantries and dead conversations. So, Breeze actually sounded like a great concept.

Here’s what my review of the Breeze dating app after having gone on two dates (and, for entertainment and education purposes, I’ll leave share screenshots of my old profile throughout).

Table of Contents

How Breeze Social Works

The whole premise of Breeze is going on dates rather than going through the “talking stage” first. Breeze helps you schedule the date and also picks a location once you match.

Each night at 7pm, you get a curated set of profiles (usually around 5-10). The algorithm supposedly matches you better the more you go through your profiles. You can’t receive new profiles without going through the old ones and rejecting or liking them.

If you and the other person both like each other, it’s a match and you get prompted to:

Confirm the date by paying for a token. Each date is 1 token and each token was just under $10 (it has been brought to my attention that it’s closer to $12 for men). In return, you do get 50% off your first drink at the date location.
Schedule the date. You get suggested dates and times and can always add your own.

Once both of you confirm and schedule, the location is revealed 1 day before. Then, 2 hours before the date, you can chat with each other.

One fun fact is that Breeze is actually a European app, so most of the locations it operates are actually in The Netherlands, Belgium, Germany, and France. NYC was its first American location.

My Experience Dating on Breeze

I used the Breeze dating app for around 2 weeks and had 3 matches and 2 dates. My first match canceled the date instead of confirming, and I met up with my other two matches at least twice.

Here’s what I liked about the app:

It was easy to use and set up. The prompts were straightforward and I just mostly reused my Hinge profile.
Not having to chat was a relief, and knowing each match was a date (unless they canceled) also made it feel like using the app was “productive”. (Don’t we all hate when you chat a lot and then it fizzles out completely and you never meet?)
On the topic of cancellation, there are penalties for that, so it did seem like most people were reliable (in my small sample size).
The bar I went to was pretty nice, with both outdoor and indoor seating. It also wasn’t too far from me in Brooklyn, though I maybe got lucky since some folks have said they got sent super far uptown. There is unfortunately no way to filter location besides “NYC,” which is really a problem for people further out in the boroughs.
You can join “dating pools” to help you get better profiles. Some of them included “ready to settle down,” something around outdoor adventure, etc. If that person is in the same dating pool, it’s listed on their profile when you review it.
There is no subscription fee. You only pay for the dates you go on. You can also get small discounts by buying packs of tokens. That said, I also have never had to pay for a dating app as a woman so this was new to me. I didn’t mind too much since Breeze was doing the date coordination.

Here’s what I didn’t like:

You couldn’t filter profiles by certain traits. For me, smoking and not having some level of spirituality are dealbreakers, so several of the profiles in my small daily pool were just auto-rejects. And, as mentioned, there was no location filter besides “NYC.”
In general, I didn’t feel super happy with the profiles in my daily pool. I just didn’t feel very interested in most people, but to be fair, knowing that a match equals a date probably made me more selective. I did find that the profiles I got tended to lean more nerdy, but I’m not sure if that’s a general pool trait or if my algorithm just decided I like nerdy guys.
There didn’t seem to be much variety in bars. I got sent to the SAME BAR two days in a row. It was so awkward to see the same workers again.
Bars didn’t always honor the 50% discount on your first drink. The bar I went had an online ordering system, so unless you flagged down a server, you didn’t get the discount (yes this is the Asian in me coming out).

And what about my dates? They were pretty normal. On both dates, we just chatted for around 2 hours. At the end, we just naturally decided to exchange numbers, but you can also do it in the app if you both agree to it.

I ended up seeing both guys at least another time outside the app, so you know it wasn’t a disaster at least. I won’t say anything else for now :) (Update: it’s been 5 months and things are going well, a bit more in my post on dating in NYC).

I ultimately deleted my Breeze profile because of dating fatigue and already having enough people to date; I also didn’t want to risk getting sent to the same bar yet again. But, if I wanted to seriously go on dates again, I would probably give it another try.

Let me know if you have any questions, and feel free to share your experiences as well!