More than 5,000 Stanford students have used Date Drop at a school with about 7,500 undergraduates. It has spread to 10 other colleges including Columbia, Princeton and MIT, and Date Drop just raised $2.1 million in venture-capital funding.
The growth, fans say, reflects a reality about many college kids: They’re intimidated by real-life courtship and overwhelmed by the endless scroll of dating apps. Entrepreneurial students have found huge demand for alternate matchmaking tools.
“It helps people take a chance on connection,” said Weng, a computer-science student who coded Date Drop in about three weeks. “You get a reason to meet up with a specific person, take some of that pressure off.”