But having briefly used Bumble, where the women must message the guy first, I never received a message better than 'hey, hows it going?'.
Now honestly, I don't believe that's because these women couldn't figure out a better opener. I just don't think they needed to because most men receive far fewer messages and will reply to any match.
To be fair, Bumble doesn't include a lot of space for you to talk about your interests. If I can't get an idea for who you are based on a picture (yes, most guys only have one), what more can I say other than introduce myself? My go-to icebreaker is "Hi! I'm Ali. I'm bad at this."
Edit: I should also note that Bumble isn't a great dating app if you also interested in same-sex relationships. Not relevant to the parent comment, but relevant to me.
Can't tell you how many girls love adventures and netflix; what exactly are you supposed to work with here?
You'd have to at least put some hobby or interest in your profile that I might relate to... But just asking about something very specific as a first message also sounds weird.
I really just wanna say "Hi" and see where it goes from there... What do women want?