It seems we aren’t the only ones who turn to dating apps when looking for a relationship — celebs do it too! While Zac Efron jumped on Tinder in 2016 following a break up, most A-listers opt for Raya, the “exclusive dating and networking platform for people in creative industries”, which launched just five years ago. Read on to find out more about which celebs have joined dating apps in an effort to find love.
Drew Barrymore
Drew Barrymore, who recently launched her new talk show, opened up during a September segment on Watch What Happens Live with Andy Cohen, about her experience with online dating. “I did terribly,” she revealed. “I got stood up and I didn’t match with anyone and my friends gave me this bloated sense of false confidence. They were like ‘You should try it, you will do great.'” Drew explained that she was using Raya, however her experience was “a car wreck”. Although she added, “I definitely had a lot of fun with it. I’ve always wanted to go on a blind date but my life got in the way of that so I thought online dating might fasciate that desire.”
Zac Efron
Hollywood A-lister and former teenage heartthrob Zac Efron may be loved up right now while living in Australia, but flash back to 2016 and he decided to give online dating a try. “Dating is something I’ll never be able to do,” he told British newspaper The Times following his breakup from Sami Miro. “As in the dictionary definition of dating, because one way or another I’ve impacted that person’s life and they’ll soon realize it. … A date has to be very long to dispel whatever people think of me.” The couple called it quits after two years of dating, but swiping on the apps didn’t exactly work out for him. “Amazingly, when I signed up for Tinder, nobody swiped me. They thought [my profile] was fake.”
Channing Tatum
Step Up star Channing Tatum who was married to fellow actor Jenna Dewan, and later dated singer Jessie J, is believed to have joined Raya in 2019. It followed his split from the “Price Tag” singer, although the pair later rekindled their romance.
Demi Lovato
Demi Lovato got very candid about a lot of topics in her documentary Simply Complicated — one of them being her dating life! She revealed that she joined Raya after her split from Wilmer Valderrama in 2016, but deleted it after getting into another relationship. “I just deleted it out of respect to the person I was with, then we broke up and I went to get back on [I couldn’t],” the former Camp Rock star told Harper’s Bazaar in April 2020. “And I was like, ‘You know what? It’s fine. I don’t need to be on this because I think I’m supposed to be alone right now.’”
Lizzo
“Truth Hurts” singer Lizzo has also tried her hand at online dating. The hitmaker joined Raya in the hopes of swiping right on one particular celeb. “I’ve done Raya. I tried to match with John Mayer — it didn’t work,” she told Busy Philipps on Busy Tonight in April 2019. She added that the app was “boring,” so she joined some “lower-echelon dating apps”, explaining, “No shade, but you don’t have to get confirmed … So I hopped on it and I had a h** phase for like a week and it was really fun.”
Niall Horan
Former One Direction crooner Niall Horan has been spotted on Raya as well. The Irish singer is believed to have joined in 2018, following his breakup from fellow songstress Hailee Steinfeld.
John Mayer
John Mayer is reportedly one of the OG Raya users. He joined the app in 2016, just one year after it launched, per a source from Us Weekly. At the time, the insider said, “his profile is a slide show of photos set to a Neil Young song.”