There’s something about online dating that feels like it should work in St Andrews. It’s a small town full of impossibly smart, well-dressed people, who should be perfect on paper. Between the many coffee shops, the beautiful architecture, and the fame surrounding the town as being the birthplace of Prince William and Kate Middleton’s romance, you’d think love (or at least a good situationship) would be inevitable.
But then you open Hinge.
Suddenly, the illusion shatters. The same five people you saw in your 10 AM tutorial are also the same people whose ‘very creative’ dating profiles describe their irrational fear as being “women” (Truly, does anyone ever really laugh at these?), and the boy from your philosophy class now has “6’0” in his bio when you know for a fact that he definitely isn’t taller than you, and you’re 5’10. You swipe left, and then right, and then left again, until you realize you’ve run out of new people… in a town that’s barely bigger than your hometown’s high school.
As Elle Williams puts it in her article “The St. Andrews Dating Paradox: When the pool is small and the matches are familiar”:
“Welcome to St. Andrews, where dating is less about romance and more like a never-ending reality show episode… If you’ve ever wondered what it’s like to swipe right only to realise your ‘perfect match’ is actually your friend’s flatmate.”
The disconnect
Because the town and university are small, everyone’s circle overlaps: the same lectures, societies, pubs, and friends. Online dating, then, rarely feels like meeting someone new, but rather someone in your extended social circle, like an academic parent, someone in your hall, or a “how do we know each other?” situation. And since everyone knows everyone (or will within a week), your matches stop feeling like strangers and start feeling like uncomfortable reminders that St Andrews really is a bubble. That familiarity, which can feel comforting, can also feel claustrophobic.
Then there’s the illusion of abundance. The apps make it seem like there’s an endless array of options, but in reality, it’s the same familiar faces rotating like an academic calendar. It tricks you into thinking you can hold out for someone better, when really you’re just avoiding real connections for the safety of a swipe.
Plus, there’s something about the apps that doesn’t quite fit with the town’s slow, romantic rhythm. St Andrews has this old-world charm that invites spontaneity, like bumping into someone at Northpoint, walking along West Sands, or talking for just five minutes in the street on the way to your next lecture and making that connection. Apps strip away that magic. They make it feel transactional, algorithmic, and oddly impersonal in a place that thrives on serendipity.
And yet, we keep downloading them. Maybe it’s the convenience. Maybe it’s boredom. Maybe it’s because we’re all secretly hoping that the next match will be the one that breaks the pattern—that somehow, in a town of only 17,000 people, our soulmate just happens to be three swipes away.
Swipe right, think twice
Online dating apps and platforms promise efficiency and excitement, and for many students, that promise spikes interest. According to a survey, 49% of UK students and graduates say they’ve fallen victim to a dating app scam, with a large share sharing personal info early on.
Though St Andrews doesn’t publish its own detailed figure (at least not publicly), we can infer that as part of the student-body age range (18-24) those risks exist here, too.
Even beyond scams: the allure of chatting to dozens of people, seeing profiles, and making decisions is fun. But the flip side is fatigue. Matching becomes a quick fix for loneliness, but often without the deeper foundation that in-person and shared environments provide. At a place like St Andrews, where there’s a strong community vibe and rich in-person opportunities (societies, halls, sports), relying solely on online dating can feel like bypassing the “real” way people meet.
Online dating at its core is mediated. Chat, emojis, cursory bios, filtered photos. One study even found that online dating profiles raise trust and privacy concerns because users can’t always verify the information they’re given.
In the St Andrews context, that means: you match, you chat, you form expectations…and maybe you meet. But meeting in person in a tight-knit town where word travels is very different from meeting someone in a big city where your social footprint is minimal. The digital illusion can crumble quickly when real life intersects.
swiping left on online dating
It’s not about ditching online dating entirely (hey, apps do bring people together). But at St Andrews, you might want to consider a “hybrid” approach:
- Join societies, go to student events, and hang out in places where you’re likely to bump into someone organically.
- Use apps with the awareness that everyone knows almost everyone else. Approach with curiosity, not expectation.
- Give yourself clear boundaries: “Match for fun” rather than “Match to find The One this term.”
- Prioritize safety: share your whereabouts with friends, meet in public places, and keep the social aspect light.
- Remember: relationships at uni often thrive when built on multiple shared contexts (classes, friends, interests) not just a single conversation online.
At the University of St Andrews, online dating isn’t the romantic escape its marketing might suggest. The small social ecosystem magnifies both the good and the bad. The “perfect match” you see on an app might be someone you already know, which is, unironically, more straightforward but also more complex. So swipe consciously, keep your expectations grounded, and don’t forget: the best connection might wait outside the app, whether that be at a society, a meeting, or over a shared coffee in town.