When it comes to dating apps, could you be sabotaging your chances of success by leaving a verbal note? New research points to yes, with stats showing that almost one in five Aussies have unmatched someone because of their voice. 

I’ve got a secret dating app habit that’s got nothing to do with finding my perfect match and everything to do with swiping shoddy profiles for sport. Because if I don’t laugh at the standard of potential partners within my radius, I might just cry. 

Luckily for me, the very best of the worst entertainment always comes in the form of voice prompts on Hinge, which is when daters respond to one of the app’s conversational prompts with an audio reply of their own. And today brought up some corkers. 

"I’m convinced that: Banana bread is lying to us. It might be shaped like bread. But we all know it’s cake.”

"A quick rant about: Definitely people who stand still on escalators when they can very much easily walk.”

"A thought I recently had in the shower: Why are there five half full body washes in here with me right now, and is that also a toxic trait of mine?”

And don’t even get me started on men who still think it’s funny to respond to “How to pronounce my name” with “B-E-N, Ben”. 

Fellas of Hinge, when you have a mere few seconds to capture the hearts and minds of swipers, why the actual f*ck are you wasting them on these pitiful answers?

Especially when your tone is one ick away from a left swipe. 

An audible ick 

According to new data from Audible, to mark the launch of a new audiobook, Sounds Like You, which explores the power of voice attraction in modern dating, unless you sound like Matthew McConaughey, you might want to keep your voice offline. At least for the time being. 

The research reveals that 18 per cent of Aussies have unmatched someone because of their voice, and 36 per cent have been turned off an attractive person due to their voice. While more than half of the country (53 per cent) think that a person’s voice is important for initial attraction, which is a lot of pressure to put on a Hinge hopeful. 

Particularly when it turns out that Aussies aren’t that into deep and powerful voices, with 28 per cent drawn to soft and gentle tones like MConaughey’s. 

How voice prompts can be impeding your prospects

First up, I’ll be the first to admit that after eight years on and off the dating apps, my standards are high and my patience has worn thin. And I’m not alone. 

“I think everyone has such high standards,” Sydney somatic sexologist Alice Child tells Body+Soul, “and I think especially when you've been on a dating app for a while, it can be so easy to get a more transactional mindset. People say things like, ‘It's a numbers game’, and before you know it, it’s very easy to get into that mindset where you’re sort of treating people like a number rather than a person.”

So with a backdrop like that, where does it leave our profiles? 

“I think voice notes can feel a little bit like easy chat up lines,” Child says. “You obviously don't have a long time to say something, so you have to really make an impact in a really short amount of time.

"As a result, I think people feel a lot of pressure to be funny or to be cheeky, and it can just not hit the mark if that's not your type of humour. So I think it’s quite a hard brief to make your personality and your humour come across in such a short space of time”.

Clearly no one told the banana bread, escalator and body wash men that they were meant to be impressing us.. 

But are we making a mistake? 

“Just like how we might get the ick from someone’s photo and then actually meet them in person and then when we’re got the context of the full person suddenly that photo of their prized fish on the fishing trip is a turn on, it’s so easy to read dating apps in the wrong way without the context of the full person,” Child says. 

“So when I'm working with clients, I do try to encourage people to see past the surface level of what a dating app profile presents, because a real person offers so much more than you could possibly get across in a few seconds on a dating profile.”

And when it comes to voice prompts, Child says they go a long way in “humanising” online dating and making the experience feel “less transactional”. 

“Voice prompts feel like a really good middle ground where you can get a sense of the way that they talk, the way that their voice sounds, and their sort of mannerisms and intonations,” explains the sex coach. And the research from Audible backs that up.

According to the survey, 30 per cent of Aussies have fallen for someone primarily due to their voice, while 46 per cent believe a person’s voice can reveal their personality and over half (62 per cent) feel that a person’s voice can make them memorable. 

“Voice is such a turn on for so many people,” Child says, pointing to the rise of audio porn. “I say this a lot in session that your voice can be an erotic tool in how you use it, the tone of your voice, the way that you talk, and then by combining it with eye contact and body language it can be such a huge part of flirting and chemistry and energy, as well as building arousal and feeling a conn