SCRUFF - Gay Dating & Chat

A noun and an adjective? A stimulating montage of beards, hairy chests, scrappy fellows, muscle dads, tattooed pigs, pups and varied interests run through my head and I’m here for it. This app is my go-to for not only sex but comradery (no joke!). I’ve met so many men with similar interests without hang ups and insecure jealousy who have become good friends. I mean, with Scruff there’s plenty to go around, right? And it’s much safer than any dark alley (as much fun as they are). If you just want to chat, let’s chat. If you want to hang out, let’s hang out. If you want to indulge in some WS with three different friends on a hiking trail, so be it (dibs on the middle)! In a Post-pandemic, PrEP-era, Queer-embracing, Shame-dismantling world I’m no longer apprehensive to say to anyone, gay or straight, “I’m getting Scruffy on Scruff.” (Side note reason for 4 stars: Sometimes unread messages get marked as read. It’ll be weeks before I go back to chat and see an old response that I missed. And I wish there was a sort of bulletin board for day to day updates without having to change my profile.)

If Scruff prevented screenshots and video screen recording for publicly posted photos, I’d upload a face picture today. I’d also like it if there was some kind of alternative verification option (like verifying a photo in a private album) besides having to verify a publicly posted photo under the existing conditions. In the meantime, a cartoonish minority of the Scruff userbase will moralize on that subject and pretend that it’s a matter of being comfortable in your own skin. Profiles need a character limit: I recommend 1,000 characters vs. effectively unlimited space. TOS enforcement is spotty at best: I’ve asked questions on this subject and gotten underwhelming answers. There are limited blocks available to both free and paid users, a confusing outcome considering the number of users on Scruff that feel entitled to special attention. I deleted the app as a result. To the developer’s response to my review: I have already provided most of this feedback using the quiet, direct method that you recommended. This method, the public feedback method, seems to be more effective than quiet, earnest feedback. I was not provided with any acknowledgement on these subjects until right just now when your team responded on the App Store. Take good care.

Scruff used to set itself apart from other gay apps in a good way. Navigating the app was easy and compared to other apps like Grindr it wasn’t flooded with spam bots. That has all changed now. My biggest complaint with Scruff is its insane slender picture cropping feature it has for when you upload pics. It forces you to pick a tiny rectangular portion of your photo to upload…cutting out a large portion of your pic. The only way to get a full head-to-toe photo to display is to upload a picture of you that was taken from a far distance away. My second biggest gripe is that the app is now flooded with spam accounts, women larping as men, and hustler/escort profiles which Scruff claims are against their rules; however when you report these accounts nothing happens and they stay active. I preferred the older layout rather than the new one where you have to click-click-click to see who woofed at you. Oh! Would be cool if they actually added a sound notification for when you get a woof! Finally…the “moments” thing is by far the worst feature they ever came up with. I really don’t care that I have “several moments waiting for me” to view…which are nothing more than nude pics uploaded by some guy who randomly woofed or messaged me months ago. Come on Scruff…be better…like you used to be.