By Ashley Edwards Walker
As part of our 2025 dating trends, we’ve selected a few of our Success Stories that speak to how dating is developing. From ”micro-mance” to “on the same fan-page”, our data reveals that how we connect is changing, with nearly 46% of singles surveyed saying unique and quirky interests are key to attraction. Because let’s face it—finding someone who gets your passions is a pretty good starting point.
After years of putting her career first, Rachel, a consultant from California, decided 2020 would be the year for dating. She was ready to step out of her comfort zone and stop limiting herself to the guys who checked off every box on her usual “type” list. Instead, she vowed to be more open to new experiences. So, she downloaded Bumble.
Enter Ramón. A scientist from New York who had also moved to D.C. for work. Ramón hadn’t used a dating app since college, but with everyone around him using apps to meet people, he figured he might as well give it a try. He downloaded Bumble and signed up for Bumble Premium. When Rachel popped up in the fall of 2020, he didn’t waste any time swiping back.
Rachel and Ramón both thought the other was cute from the start, but for Rachel, it was Ramón’s intelligence—she knew he was a scientist from his profile—and his two adorable dogs, that drew her in. Ramón, on the other hand, was intrigued by Rachel’s “not stereotypical” photos and her ability to speak Spanish fluently, which gave her instant bonus points. Growing up in a Cuban family where Spanish was the first language, it felt like a big deal to have a partner who could speak the same language.
“Family is important to me,” Ramón says. “So Rachel speaking Spanish was a huge plus.”
Rachel kicked off the conversation and their chat flowed easily. They spoke about their profiles, their hobbies, and their shared interests. Rachel, the outgoing creative type, had just started a ceramics course and was eager to tell Ramón about the tiles she was working on. Ramón, who describes himself as “very shy,” was a little more reserved. Still, he was good at keeping their conversation going, asking thoughtful questions about Rachel’s creative interests. After a few weeks of texting, they finally agreed to meet in person in November 2020 at a local Mexican restaurant. Rachel had planned to visit her family for the holidays but was playing it safe with COVID-19, so she chose an outdoor table—even though it was a bit chilly. Then it started to rain. Ramón didn’t complain once, which, for Rachel, was a major win.
“One thing I appreciated about dating in 2020 was getting a sneak peek of how considerate people were,” Rachel says.
They stayed at the restaurant for over three hours, chatting about everything from sports (they both played competitively) to their love of dogs. When the night ended, Rachel left feeling intrigued, but she wasn’t sure if the spark was there. When she got home, she told her roommates about the date. The consensus? Give Ramón one more shot before making any final calls. Ramón, on the other hand, left the date already knowing how much he liked her.
Their second date came just a week later at a beer garden. COVID wasn’t hanging over them anymore, and Ramón opened up more about his interests and hobbies. The date went so well that they ended up spending 24 hours together. From there, they spent a lot of time hanging out at each other’s places. With winter setting in and travel still risky due to the pandemic, they decided to spend the holidays together. This turned into a whirlwind of celebrations—Thanksgiving, Christmas Eve, Hanukkah, New Year’s Eve, Kwanzaa, Three Kings Day—all packed into their first couple of months of dating.
“It was a lot of learning about each other and each other’s cultures very quickly,” Rachel says.
Those celebrations, plus meeting each other’s families and friends virtually, fast-forwarded their relationship. While Rachel and Ramón had “both dated people from other backgrounds” before meeting, says Ramón, Rachel hadn’t dated anyone Cuban before. Which meant many of his traditions and foods were new to her. Luckily, she had a leg up since her Spanish language skills allowed her to “legitimately communicate with my family, which was cool,” he says. And she lived in Latin America for a time, “which is similar” to Cuba culturally, he adds. One of Rachel’s favorite memories from that time happened on Christmas Eve, when she introduced Ramón to her mother over Facetime. They spent four hours cooking together, with Ramón teaching them how to make several of his favorite Cuban dishes. Her mom “still references that to this day,” she says, and it made their eventual in-person meeting so much better because her mom and Ramón had already built a connection.
Ramón wasn’t totally new to Jewish traditions—he’d grown up in New York City attending bar and bat mitzvahs and celebrating Hanukkah and Passover. So when Rachel invited him to join a virtual Hanukkah celebration with her coworkers, he jumped in, pulling out one of his yamakas and participating in the candle lighting. For Rachel, that moment stood out.
“I think it was just the multifaceted nature of his personality and the exposure that he had to my own culture that surprised and interested me,” she says.
Ramón adds that those early moments of sharing and openness are something that continues to strengthen their bond to this day.
“It’s cool to constantly be learning something new and seeing things from a different perspective,” he says.
Early on, when Ramón mentioned he was allergic to certain common ingredients found in candles, Rachel started making him custom candles that worked with his allergies. He loved them so much that he convinced her to start selling them at local pop-ups, helping her set up her shop.
“Ramón is such a positive, driven, and curious person,” says Rachel. “He makes me feel comfortable enough to tell him my ideas or things I want to try, then encourages me and inspires confidence by rolling up his sleeves to do it with me!”
Ramón, in turn, introduced Rachel to anime, and she made an effort to learn about it so they could enjoy it together. In November 2022, nearly two years after their first Bumble date, Ramón proposed.
“I just don’t know that Ramón and I would have met if it hadn’t been for Bumble,” she says, pointing out their racial, religious, and cultural differences, not to mention their vastly different careers. “And I think the biggest thing is we were open and curious, which allowed us to connect and learn more about each other.”
*Research was conducted by Bumble using internal polling from September 19 to 23, 2024, with a sample of 41,294 Bumble members aged 18 to 35 worldwide.