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Hello Group runs a Chinese dating and social app called Momo, plus a separate app called Tantan, and makes money mostly from people buying virtual gifts and subscriptions.
Hello Group is a Chinese social and dating company. Its flagship app, Momo, started as a way for strangers nearby to chat, and it grew into a place where people watch live streams, join group chats, and send each other virtual gifts. A second app, Tantan, works more like Tinder: swipe left or right on people nearby to find a match. Together, these apps serve hundreds of millions of registered users in China, mostly young adults looking to meet people, kill time, or show off a little.
The money mostly comes from entertainment, not from charging people to send messages. Users buy virtual coins and spend them on digital gifts — a rose, a sports car, a castle — that they send to live-stream hosts or to people they are chatting with. The company keeps a cut of each gift, and the host gets the rest. Momo also sells subscriptions, such as a premium tier that lets you see who viewed your profile, and it runs a small advertising business. Tantan, by contrast, makes most of its money from subscriptions that unlock extra swipes and better matches. The business is profitable and throws off a lot of cash, but growth is hard. China's internet population is already huge, and the pool of new users to sign up is shrinking. Competition is fierce from short-video giants like Douyin, which eat into people's screen time, and from other dating apps. Tantan has struggled to grow, and the company has spent heavily to keep it alive. At the same time, regulators in China have cracked down on live-streaming and on apps that mix strangers together, adding uncertainty to the core business.
In 2011, a tiny team of four people launched Momo, a social app that helped people find and talk to others nearby. The idea was simple: your phone knows where you are, so it can introduce you to people around you.
Just a few years later, the company went public on NASDAQ under the ticker MOMO. That was a big milestone: the little app with four founders was now a public company.
In 2015, the company reached profitability, with a first-quarter net profit of about US$6.7 million. That same year, it introduced MomoLive, a live-streaming feature that would become a big part of how the app made money.
In 2018, Momo bought Tantan, a dating app popular with younger users that had been founded in 2014. The deal mixed cash and stock, and it gave Momo a second major app aimed at a younger crowd.
Also in 2018, the company's market value climbed above $10 billion. But that peak did not last: the market value later fell to about $700 million, more than 90% below where it once stood.
In 2021, the company changed its name from Momo Inc. to Hello Group Inc. The new name signaled that it was more than just one app.
By early 2026, total revenue was slipping, down 5% from a year earlier. But the mix was shifting fast: overseas revenue jumped 44% and made up a quarter of the business, up from 16% a year before, while domestic revenue fell 15% as tax scrutiny and weak consumer spending weighed on the home market.
Hello Group has used its cash to buy back its own shares aggressively, a sign management thinks the stock is cheap. The company has also tried to build new things, like a dating app for overseas markets, though those efforts are still small. The core story is simple: a mature, cash-rich app company in a market that is no longer growing quickly, trying to squeeze more money from the users it already has while searching for a second act.
Saved answer · last researched 22 Oct 2026