Popular gay dating app Grindr has announced that it would implement new safeguards and restrictions in-app to protect competitors at the 2026 Milano Cortina Winter Olympics.The protections are meant to safeguard athletes who aren’t out or are coming from countries where LGBTQ+ activity is illegal or restricted.
“Grindr shows users who’s nearby and how far away they are. In most contexts, that’s useful,” Grindr’s team writes on their blog. “In the Olympic Village where thousands of athletes are packed into a small area, those same features may become a liability.”
“Someone outside the Village could browse profiles inside it. Distance data could be used to pinpoint someone’s exact location. And simply appearing on Grindr tells the world something about a person’s identity that, in more than 60 countries, remains a criminal offense,” the blog post continued.
With the new changes, Grindr’s “Explore and Roam” feature will be disabled for those within Olympic Village boundaries during the games. This means users outside the Village will not be able to browse or message users within. The app’s feature which displays how far away other users are, will be defaulted to off for users in the Village during the games. However, users can still choose to display approximate distance on the profile. Athletes using Grindr in the Olympic Village will also have access to new free privacy tools, including disappearing messages, screenshot blocking, and an ‘unsend’ feature.
At this year’s winter Olympics, around 41 out LGBTQ+ athletes from 13 different countries will compete in nine varied events; A figure which tops the number of out athletes at the 2024 Summer Olympics which landed at approximately 29, according to the Human Rights Campaign.
