Desire couples game: dares on a clock, and love keeps score

A closed league for two: what Desire is

Desire, listed in the stores as “Desire - Couples Game,” is a dare game for two on iPhone, iPad and Android, made by Desire Technologies, Ltd., a UK company. It has been on the App Store since October 2014, which makes it one of the veterans among the Kindu alternatives we cover. Its site is clear about what it isn’t: “not a social network,” but “a closed space for you and your partner.” No audience, no strangers, just the two of you and a scoreboard.

A founder’s reason

There’s a human story behind the points. In a foreword on the app’s Google Play page, founder and CEO Pol Gerbeau writes that at 40, a father of two, his marriage “began to shake” and his family “broke into pieces.” So he built Desire to keep couples connected. It shows in the design: this is an app made to keep two people playing with each other, week after week, long after the first dates are a memory.

Dares, deadlines and points: how a round goes

The loop is simple. One of you picks a dare and sends it, and the sender sets how long the other has to complete it. Done in time, the dare’s points land on the scoreboard. Keep going, and the points lead toward the Chili level.

Three ways to find a dare

• The catalog. A library of ready-made dares, sorted into categories, with new ones added regularly. Send the ones you like.
• Your own. Write a dare in your own words and give it your own points. This is where the game gets personal: no catalog knows what tempts your partner better than you do.
• The AI. Since November 2025, Desire can write dares for you, tailored, in its words, to your “preferences, mood, and relationship style.”

The little world around the dares

Desire was “completely redesigned” in January 2025, and around the dares sit a handful of extras:

• eLoves. Shake your phone and Desire offers a short message to send. A tiny, silly, surprisingly effective way to say “thinking of you” in the middle of a meeting.
• A private chat with messages, stickers and photos you can partly pixelate, so a picture can arrive half-hidden.
• A daily quiz you each answer blind, before you see the other’s answer.
• A lucky wheel, for the nights when neither of you wants to be the one who chooses.
• A shared journal, plus badges and achievements (trophies, on Android), for couples who like something to show for it.

Why a little rivalry is so flirty

Desire’s own blog makes the case for low-stakes competition, “dares, not ultimatums,” as a way to bring back the excitement of early dating. That’s the company talking, and anyone who has ever demanded a rematch after losing a board game to their partner will recognize the feeling.

A few things happen at once when a dare arrives with a clock attached:

• The countdown. An ordinary Tuesday afternoon turns into a deadline you can’t stop thinking about.
• The roles. Sending lets one of you take charge for a while. Receiving lets the other say yes without having to come up with the idea, which is often the hardest part.
• The bragging rights. Points give you something to gloat about, and something to win back.

Underneath all of it is anticipation. Back in 2019, a relationship coach quoted by Forbes said an app like this helps busy couples “build anticipation,” and that’s the real prize. A dare worth a fortune in points, sent at breakfast and due at bedtime, is tease and denial with a scoreboard: the waiting is the fun.

Ideas to try this week

• Make the scoreboard the stake. Whoever is behind on Sunday plans the next date night, start to finish, and the winner doesn’t learn where they’re going until they’re in the car.
• Make the tease worth a fortune. Write a custom dare, attach a huge score and a short timer: “Text me the one thing you’re thinking about for tonight before your 3 p.m. call.” Urgency does wonderful things to a workday.
• Play blur and guess. Send a partly pixelated photo of what you’re wearing, or where you are, and make your partner guess. A right answer earns the reveal at home.
• Quiz now, talk later. Answer the blind daily quiz on your lunch break and save the discussion for dinner, in person, where you can watch each other’s faces when the answers don’t match.
• Let the wheel decide. Spin the lucky wheel and agree beforehand that whatever it lands on stands, with one exception: each of you keeps a veto, no questions asked.
• Apart for a while? Time a dare to land just before your evening video call, on whatever app you call on, and make doing it on camera the condition for the points.
• Keep the good ones. When a dare turns into a great evening, write it up in the shared journal. Months later, it reads like a love letter with a scoreboard attached.

Keeping it kind, and keeping it private

Competition is fun right up until somebody feels pushed. A few house rules keep Desire playful.

A no costs nothing

In Desire, one partner chooses the dare, sets the deadline and names the points, so the other has to be free to decline. Say it out loud before you start: any dare can be turned down, and a no never counts against anyone. Points never outrank comfort. Before you climb toward the Chili level, go through the Yes, No, Maybe list together, so you both know where the edges are before a timer starts ticking.

Where your photos live

Desire says photos, videos, messages, dares and journal entries are “encrypted and secured,” that only you and your partner can see your messages, and that it keeps media on its servers so you can delete it from your phone. That’s handy if your phone gets borrowed. It also means your pictures exist somewhere besides your camera roll, and we found no screenshot blocking, so assume anything you send can be saved. Put that pixelation to work on faces, tattoos, jewelry and recognizable rooms, and save the most intimate moments for in person.

Ads, permissions and location

Desire is free with ads unless you pay to remove them, and its App Store privacy label lists identifiers that may be used to track you. Its privacy policy names the ad and analytics services it works with, and the app can ask for your camera, microphone, storage and approximate location. Grant only what you need, switch location off if you’d rather it stayed off, and check that your camera isn’t stamping where you are into the photos you send.

Adults only

The App Store rates Desire 18+ for frequent sexual content or nudity, and Google Play rates it Mature 17+. This page, like the app’s spicy side, is for grown-ups.

Who makes the move: Desire and A Little Bit of Corruption compared

Before we keep score ourselves: we make A Little Bit of Corruption, so treat our scorecard as the home team’s. Both are dare games for two, and they answer one question very differently: who decides what happens next?

Where they really part is the moment of asking. In Desire, sending a dare is the move: you choose it, you set the clock, and your partner sees exactly what you had in mind. In our game, nobody has to ask first. A dare only one of you liked never leaves that phone, so a quiet curiosity can wait safely until it turns out to be mutual. A dare is meant to fill an evening, scene included, and some slip one of you a few lines the other never sees.

On money: Desire’s optional Platinum subscription unlocks all its categories, unlimited AI dares, the Chili level and an ad-free app, and the Chili level and ad removal are also sold on their own. Prices change, so we’ve left them out.

Scoreboard or secret yes: which suits you

Desire may suit you better if

• you love a rivalry, and a scoreboard makes you both try harder;
• one of you enjoys sending the orders and the other enjoys receiving them;
• you want a ready-made catalog to play from tonight, AI dares tuned to your mood, and the freedom to write your own;
• you’d like a chat, a journal, a daily quiz and a wheel all in one place;
• you prefer a native app from the stores, from a team that’s been at it since 2014.

A Little Bit of Corruption may suit you better if

• one of you would rather not be the first to ask, and a dare only you wanted should stay your secret;
• you’d rather have a map that grows from your own choices, one dare at a time, than a catalog to pick from;
• you’re curious about the whole range, from sweet and sensual to deeply kinky, while only ever seeing the dares your choices lead to;
• you’d like a game that’s free, with no ads, in a web app you install from the browser.

Plenty of couples could enjoy both, Desire for the weekday back-and-forth and ours for the evenings you plan around a single dare. If a scoreboard isn’t quite your style, our pages on Spicer and Intimately Us show two other ways to play.

Questions