Based on in-depth interviews with daters around the globe, a fun and whip-smart social history of online dating tracing the fascinating ways we try to find love in a world that has changed rapidly around us, from Victorian-era personal ads to Hinge prompts.

For better or worse (these days you’re more likely to hear “worse”) online dating has, over the last few decades, become a fundamental part of modern courtship. As traditional communities and social institutions have eroded and transformed, technology has stepped in to mediate, re-stitching how we form basic bonds. Despite recent discontent, with so much of our lives online, matchmaking powered by algorithm is unlikely to go anywhere.

In U Up? reporter Hanna Kozlowska brings this evolution to life through the insightful, occasionally heartbreaking, often funny voices of dozens of regular daters from all walks of life, while also investigating the social, economic, and political forces at play. From punch-card matchmaking on room-sized computers in the 1960s, to the online chatroom romance and OkCupid, to the development of ever more specific services like Shaadi.com, Farmers’ Only or Feeld, to the new frontiers of VR dates and AI companions, Kozlowska weaves a lively, razor-sharp history of searching for love and connection.

Rigorously reported and rivetingly told, U Up? will be a balm to countless online daters, providing context for their struggles, commiserating laughs at the striking similarities between 19th-century matrimonial ads and Tinder bios , and perhaps even a bit of hope in the shared humanity of those behind the screen. An essential read for anyone who’s ever received a “u up?” text and wondered how matchmaking got to this point and where it could be going next.