Apple moves dating apps and romantic AI chatbots behind an 18-plus rating

Apple moves dating apps and romantic AI chatbots behind an 18-plus rating

Apple is set to enforce new App Store age rating requirements that will restrict dating apps and AI chatbots offering romantic or sexual interactions to adults. According to The Verge, the company announced the changes on Monday alongside new content descriptors that developers will soon be required to complete.

Developers must declare dating and location features

The expanded age rating questionnaire in App Store Connect will ask developers to declare two things: whether an app allows users to share their real-world location with other people, and whether it includes features that enable dating, relationships or sexual behaviour, either between real people or with virtual companions.

Apps offering dating or relationship features will carry a minimum age rating of 18 once the rules take effect. Location sharing will also affect an app's minimum rating, but The Verge reports the exact impact will depend on local regulations and will therefore vary between regions.

The rollout begins on November 16th, when the new declarations appear in the App Store Connect questionnaire. Every app on the store will then be required to complete the updated declarations by January 12th, 2027.

Extending an existing adults-only category

Apple already operates an 18-plus tier on the App Store, though it has mostly been applied to apps containing gambling, violence, references to drugs, alcohol or tobacco, and nudity or sexual content. Most mainstream dating platforms already restrict themselves to adult users on their own. The Verge characterises the broader ratings push as an effort to close the gaps that have nevertheless allowed minors to reach adult-oriented apps.

The new rules also take explicit aim at conversational AI. According to The Verge, the restrictions are intended to keep younger users away from AI chatbots that support sexual or romantic interactions, as well as virtual romantic partner simulators, which the report notes have been raised as a potential mental health risk.

Why it matters

For developers, the most immediate consequence is administrative: every app on the store, not just dating platforms, will need to audit its features and complete the new declarations before the January 2027 deadline. The location-sharing descriptor in particular reaches well beyond dating apps, touching social, fitness and family-oriented products that share a user's position with others, and the regional variation means a single app's minimum rating may differ from one market to the next.

For developers of AI companion apps, the change is more substantive. An app whose chatbot supports romantic roleplay will be classified in the same adults-only bracket Apple reserves for gambling and explicit content, regardless of how the app otherwise presents itself. That effectively removes any ambiguity about whether romantic AI features can ship under a general-audience rating, and it signals that Apple now treats emotionally engaging chatbots as a content risk category in their own right rather than a neutral software feature.