Safety is always top of mind at Hinge. In some countries, additional safeguards apply to services intended for adults. For example, the EU Digital Services Act, the UK’s Online Safety Act, Australia’s Social Media Minimum Age Act and Brazil’s Digital ECA require that online platforms use age assurance methods to protect young people online. Our automated age check processes help us ensure that all Hinge members are adults, as required by applicable law and our Terms of Use. These measures also help keep the Hinge community safe and aligned with the values we care about most: authenticity, courage and empathy.
Hinge uses a variety of age assurance methods (“age checks”) to help us ensure that you’re at least 18 years old. In general, we need at least one photo including your face to estimate your age with automated technology. The age check process presented to you may vary depending on applicable legal requirements and guidance in your region.
If you are presented with an age check, you must complete it to fully access Hinge. You won’t be able to send likes or messages, and your profile won’t be visible to others, until you successfully complete the age check.
After completing your Age Check, you may be prompted to complete an ID Check to help us confirm that you are 18, or in accordance with applicable legal requirements and guidelines, for example, in the UK. If presented with an ID check, you must complete it to access Hinge. See Why is Hinge requesting an ID check?
Additionally, in some regions, we may receive age information provided by the Apple App Store or Google Play Store to help prevent anyone under 18 from accessing our service. See Age check based on app store profile.
How does Hinge estimate my age?
Click on an age check measure below to learn more about how it works and the jurisdiction(s) in which it applies, or click on a specific jurisdiction to navigate directly to its applicable age check measure(s).
By age check Measure:
By Jurisdiction:
- Australia
- Brazil (also see Age check based on app store profile)
- European Economic Area (including the EU) and Switzerland
- United Kingdom
- United States: Texas
Age Check review: what does Hinge do with my age estimate?
Why is Hinge Requesting ID Verification?
Where can I learn more about Hinge’s data practices?
How does Hinge estimate my age?
Face Check™ scan
Applicable region(s): United Kingdom
We’re rolling out a requirement that new users complete a biometric Face Check™ scan with a video selfie in order to help make Hinge a more authentic place. When you take a video selfie, we use facial scanning technology to check that the video was taken of a real, live person, and that it was not digitally altered or manipulated. Your facial geometry, which may be considered “biometric information” in some places, will be used and stored to check your profile photos, reduce fraud, and detect whether other profiles are using your likeness.
Face Check also helps us estimate your age. We capture and store three audit images-screenshots–from your video selfie, which are analyzed with automated technology to estimate whether or not you’re 18 or over. See Age Check review: what does Hinge do with my age estimate?
- Note: For UK users with accounts created before 25 June 2026, Hinge performed a similar age estimation process on a profile photo containing the user’s face. See the Face Photo Upload section below for additional information on this process.
After successfully completing your video selfie and uploading a clear solo face photo that matches the face in your video selfie, you’ll automatically get a Selfie Verified badge on your profile.
Video selfie
Applicable Region(s): European Economic Area (including the EU) and Switzerland
If you live in the EEA or Switzerland, you will be prompted to take a video selfie. You can authorize Hinge to use your video selfie only to complete your age and liveness checks. Or, you can opt-in to use your video selfie to complete Selfie Verification at the same time.
Age check and liveness only: If you authorize Hinge to use your video selfie only for your age and liveness checks, we use facial scanning technology to check that the video was taken of a real, live person, and that it was not digitally altered or manipulated. We capture and store three audit images–screenshots–from your video selfie, which are analyzed with automated technology to estimate whether you’re 18 or over. See Age Check review: what does Hinge do with my age estimate?
Age check with optional Selfie Verification: In addition to completing the mandatory age and liveness checks, you can also opt in to Selfie Verification. A Selfie Verification badge on your profile shows other daters you look like your photos. If you opt in, we’ll check that the photos on your profile match the face in your video using your facial geometry, which may be considered “biometric information” in some places. You’ll get a profile badge if they match.
See our Selfie Verification article for full details about how your data is processed.
Note: If you don’t opt-in to Selfie Verification at the same time as your mandatory age and liveness checks, you won’t receive a Selfie Verified badge. If you change your mind, you can always access the Selfie Verification feature later from either Edit Profile, Settings, or the Safety tab.
Face photo upload
Applicable Region(s): Australia, Brazil
If you’re located in these regions, you'll need to upload at least one clear photo of your face to your profile so that we can complete the age check process. This helps us confirm that you meet the minimum age requirement to use Hinge, as required by law and our Terms of Use. We’ll use automated technology to confirm that at least one of your profile photos is a solo photo of you and to detect your face. If we do not detect a solo face photo, you’ll be prompted to upload one.
Our automated technology analyzes your uploaded face photo(s) to estimate whether or not you’re 18 or over. See Age check review: what does Hinge do with my age estimate?
Age check based on app store profile
Applicable Region(s): Brazil and United States: Texas
Where applicable, we use age information provided by the Apple App Store or Google Play Store to prevent anyone under 18 from accessing our service.
For new users: You will be asked to share your Age Range, as determined by your Apple or Google Play Store account, to confirm you are over the age of 18. Your specific age and birthday will not be shared with Hinge. If you decline to share your age range information with Hinge, you will not be able to create a Hinge account.
If you are in one of the regions listed above and over 18 but unable to create an account, please check your app store settings to ensure:
- Your date of birth is correct
- Your account is not under parental supervision, and
- Age information sharing is enabled.
Once your settings are updated, return to Hinge and try again.
Note: After confirming your age range using your App Store information, you may be required to complete one of the age checks outlined above in accordance with applicable law.
Age check review: what does Hinge do with my age estimate?
Your face photo(s) or audit images are analyzed by automated technology to assess the likelihood that you’re at least 18 years old.
- If we determine you’re likely over 18, you can continue using Hinge as usual and will be directed to the Discover Page.
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If we can’t confirm your age, we’ll complete a manual review or request additional verification, such as an ID check.
- For new users: During this review, you can send Likes or Skip profiles in Discover. However, any Likes you send won’t be delivered until after we’ve completed the manual review.
- For current users: During this review, your Likes will be delivered as normal during the review.
- If we determine you’re most likely under 18, your account will be removed. To use Hinge, you’ll need to submit an appeal, as described below.
The results of your age check may be used to help train certain machine learning models that support our trust and safety tools, as well as to test and audit those models and tools.
Why is Hinge requesting an ID check?
After completing your age check, you may be prompted to complete an ID check to help us confirm you are at least 18, in accordance with applicable legal requirements and guidelines (such as in the UK), and to check whether you appear to match the photo on your ID. You won’t be able to start connecting with people on Hinge until we verify your ID.
Completing an ID verification check
You’ll be prompted to upload a valid government-issued ID that shows your date of birth and a photo of your face. Acceptable IDs vary by region, but the most common types include:
- Driver’s license or learner’s permit
- Passport or passport card
- National ID card
- Residence permit
Hinge’s technology will check whether:
- Your Face Check scan matches the photo on your ID; and
- The date of birth on the ID indicates you are at least 18 years old.
If your ID doesn’t meet these criteria or Hinge's technology is unable to verify it, you may be prompted to try again, or a Hinge team member will review your ID manually. While your ID is being reviewed, you can continue setting up your account, but you won’t be able to view, match with or message other daters.
If we determine that you are most likely underage, your account will be banned. If you want you can submit an appeal. See Can I appeal an age check?
How Hinge handles your ID check data
The results of the ID check (i.e., successful or not) are saved until 90 days after your account is closed (or 2 years if the account is banned).
We keep a copy of your ID for 30 days to help audit and troubleshoot the ID check process.
Your FaceMap is retained as described in Hinge’s Face Check article and Privacy Policy.
None of your ID check data appears on your profile or is shown to other daters.
Can I appeal an age check?
If your account is removed for being underage and you believe this was a mistake, you can appeal the decision. We may ask you to complete an ID check to confirm your age.
If you're a resident of Australia and would like an alternative to submitting your government-issued ID to appeal an age-related ban, please email us at hello@hinge.co with the subject line “Australia Appeal No ID” to request an additional review of your account by a moderator.
How is my data stored?
The results from your age check will be stored in a secure format for 1 year. Your audit images, photo(s) and moderation records are processed in accordance with Hinge’s Privacy Policy. This means that Hinge will keep audit images and profile photos for the life of an account (plus the applicable retention period following account closure or ban), profile photos will continue to be visible on your profile until you replace them, and moderation records are retained for the life of the account (plus the applicable retention period following account closure or ban). Audit images are not added to your profile.
Where applicable, Hinge retains the App Store-provided Age Range for the life of the account, plus five years following account closure, to comply with applicable law and demonstrate our compliance, in accordance with Section 9 of our Privacy Policy.
See How Hinge handles your ID check data above for details about how Hinge stores this type of data.
Your data is securely stored on Amazon Web Services (AWS). The technology used to estimate age is proprietary to Match Group. Learn more about how AWS handles data.
Where can I learn more about Hinge’s data practices?
For more information about how Hinge processes your personal data, please review our Privacy Policy, including the Your Rights section, as well as our Help Center article, Why We Share Across Match Group Companies.
For more information about how and why we moderate, check out our article Automated Decision Making and Profiling at Hinge.