Is the "80-20 Rule" of Dating Apps Legit? Reddit Thread Unpacks the Data

If you Google the 80/20 rule in relationships, there are a lot of different answers. Some believe that the 80/20 rule means that a relationship is considered strong if things are good 80 percent of the time and only bad 20 percent of the time.

The 80/20 rule can also mean that you should get about 80 percent of your wants and needs from a healthy relationship and only have to provide 20 percent for yourself.

But as one woman explained on Reddit, her husband believes there's also an 80/20 rule when it comes to men and women meeting on dating apps.

One woman (u/EleventhGarden) took to Reddit to discuss what her husband calls the 80/20 rule. Per his definition, it means that "80 percent of women are only dating the top 20 percent of men."

As she wrote in her post: "My husband has been repeating this more and more frequently, parroting co-workers and mid-life crisis family members. I asked him tonight to show me statistics. Prove to me that this isn't another way to blame women for simply having standards. He could not."

Therefore, she decided to do her own research on the topic.

She explains that statistically speaking, more men than women are on dating apps, which is in fact true.

Per Bedbible.com, 75.8 percent of Tinder users are male and 24.2 percent are female. That said, even if every woman on the app found a partner, many single men would still be left. She also notes that these gender stats don't factor in the LGBTQ community.

Furthermore, she explained that her husband argued that women are choosing men based on their looks and height. And that only the "top men," "tallest men," and "most attractive men" are having sex with women.

But as she wrote: "Who is determining what is attractive? Tall by what standard? What factors determine a 'top' man? Because the female gaze is not the male gaze. I'm barely 5 feet tall. I could give a rat's a-- about height."

She concluded that there is no data to back up his narrative. "I reminded my husband that feelings were not facts (his words) and that until he could provide actual studies by actual scientists or statistical data from one of these dating sites, I would assume that none of it was true or reputable. It's confirmation bias," she wrote.

Many women commented on the post agreeing with u/EleventhGarden that there is no factual evidence proving his 80/20 rule.

Some also shared anecdotes about their former male partners that refuted his claim that women are only going after the "top men," "tallest men," and "most attractive men."

"One of my exes is still referred to as 'Trash Man' because he showed up to go on a trip with his clothes in a garbage bag," chimed in one user.

Another person wrote, "My first thought reading this post was, has he met my ex the broke alcoholic?"

Meanwhile, one user offered an interesting perspective on why it seems like women are only dating the "top men."

"Women are bettering themselves in real ways while [men] are using spite to become gym bros and that makes them somehow think they are better emotionally, spiritually, mentally. I have lots of female friends who are single and very dateable. I have absolutely no male friends who are single and dateable, plenty of undateable though," she wrote.

She continued: "Women realized they don't NEED men and we aren't settling for losers who think Andrew Tate, Jordan Peterson, or Ben Shapiro are geniuses."

Mic drop.

That said, maybe men should work on bettering themselves and maybe it won't seem like only the "top men" are dating women.