Meetup’s new cell app is designed to make it simpler to fulfill folks IRL

In the event you’re like me, it is in all probability been a sizzling minute because you’ve used and even considered Meetup. Predating each Fb and Twitter, the web site, which was designed to assist folks arrange in-person occasions, has modified arms a handful of instances lately.

In 2017, founder Scott Heiferman offered it to WeWork, which offloaded it just a few years later earlier than declaring bankruptcy in 2023. As of 2024, Bending Spoons, the Italian tech firm that is in all probability greatest recognized for purchasing Evernote in 2022, has been operating Meetup.

Within the aftermath of the pandemic, the platform has seen one thing of resurgence. As of late 2025, Gen Z and younger Millennials make up 40 p.c of Meetup’s energetic person base and symbolize its most engaged group of customers. This 12 months, the app has additionally seen a 20 p.c year-over-year enhance in new registrations. Going into 2026, Bending Spoons is hoping to construct on that momentum with a redesign of Meetup’s cell app.

The brand new interface, which begins rolling out right now, brings the Android and iOS app inline with Meetup’s not too long ago redesigned web site. Throughout the appliance, customers can anticipate up to date fonts, new extra colourful icons and higher spacing. The objective of the redesign is to make the app “vibrant, enjoyable and extra trendy than earlier than,” says Chiara Vivaldi, Meetup’s product lead. She provides the redesigned app retains all the important thing options discovered within the earlier model, whereas making these simpler to search out. As an illustration, customers can entry their profile and teams instantly from the homepage of the app.

Past making Meetup really feel extra trendy, Bending Spoon is utilizing the redesign to cement the groundwork for a collection of enhancements it plans to roll out within the coming months.

In accordance with Vivaldi, one main precedence is to present folks, significantly girls, extra confidence to attend the occasions which can be listed on Meetup. Whenever you navigate to an occasion web page within the new app, you may see a broad gender and age breakdown of the customers who’ve signed as much as be there. Moreover, new and richer person profiles enable folks to get a greater sense of who precisely they could meet in the event that they resolve to go. Bending Spoons can be introducing a brand new Tremendous Organizer badge it plans to award to the platform’s high occasion planners. It is designed to sign to customers that the one who put collectively the occasion takes group constructing significantly.

Taken collectively, Vivaldi says these options are designed to cut back the friction of attending occasions the place you won’t know anybody, and so they’re one thing the corporate plans to construct on sooner or later.

On the similar time, Bending Spoons plans to make it simpler for organizers to make use of Meetup. Beginning early subsequent 12 months, the corporate will unify Meetup’s two disparate apps — proper now, the corporate maintains separate ones for members and organizers. Vivaldi says organizers can anticipate the unified app to incorporate the entire options they depend upon, alongside a handful of enhancements. As an illustration, Vivaldi’s staff is working to make QR-based ticketing the norm for check-ins and attendance monitoring. She says the transfer to a single app is knowledgeable by the truth that 75 p.c of Meetup’s organizers obtained their begin as a member.

“[Organizers] are a part of the group. They need to be within the motion, and so having them throughout the similar app is conducive to that. They will soar into conversations, take a look at different occasions, making all of it really feel a bit extra natural,” Vivaldi stated. Within the meantime, if it’s been because you’ve used Meetup, you’ll be able to obtain the redesigned app from the App and Google Play shops.