When the biblical Abraham sought a wife for his son Isaac, he dispatched his trusted servant to the city of Nahor in Mesopotamia. The servant, Eliezer, stopped at a well and prayed for a sign: the right woman would offer water not just to him, but to his camels as well. Rebecca did exactly that — and became Isaac’s match.

That story now has a modern namesake. A new dating app called The Well, slated to launch in the coming weeks, exclusively matches Jewish day school alumni. It’s aiming to fill a void for the very affiliated Jews searching for their bashert but tired of swiping. 

“As I started to watch the way the world — at least in my Modern Orthodox circle — was meeting or not meeting each other, something felt very broken to me,” Erica Schwartz, the app’s founder, told Jewish Insider on Tu B’Av, the Jewish holiday of love, which began at sundown on Tuesday. 

“Back in my day, we’d go to a synagogue and you’d meet and mingle outside and somebody might give you a call. Now everything is through a matchmaker and people aren’t meeting in person so everything is moving to more formal apps or shidduch résumés.”

Schwartz graduated from the Modern Orthodox Ramaz School on Manhattan’s Upper East Side, where she now serves as board chair. She also sent all six of her children to Jewish day schools. She said the aforementioned methods of dating were not “speaking to what I look at as this large middle niche I’m putting under the banner of the day school crowd, where they have a Jewish background and identity so they’re not a random Jew out there on a dating site, and they’re also not the ultra-Orthodox dater who is going to, through a matchmaker, go on six dates and then get married.”

“In that middle camp are all these day school graduates who are looking to meet somebody,” continued Schwartz. “It seems like such a natural place of overlap and connection, they just need to become aware of each other. That’s what The Well is trying to do — build a niche area of Jewish dating.” 

Unlike mainstream dating apps — including other Jewish ones — known for endless swiping, The Well features no swiping at all, which makes it feel more personal, said Schwartz. She describes the platform as “human intuition and wisdom working in tandem with technology.”  

The Well enters a crowded field of established Jewish dating apps — swipe-based JSwipe, application-only Lox Club and older-skewing JDate. But it’s betting that its swipe-free, day-school-verified niche can reach daters that those other platforms don’t.  

Users, who must be in their 20s and 30s, begin by filling out a profile form. The first thing they’re asked to note is the day school they attended and year of graduation. Day school graduates of all backgrounds — from pluralistic to yeshiva — are welcome to join, but users must submit two names of people who can vouch that they attended that school. “That’s our current verification system. We need to see how that works and are prepared to tighten it a bit,” said Schwartz.  

The profile form then prompts users to speak with a chatbot named Elli — a nod to Eliezer from the biblical story. 

Elli is trained to ask follow-up questions in nuanced ways and pick up the user’s personality, said Schwartz. It asks users to describe their religious beliefs, share their profession and include key dating details like height preference or college alma mater.

Users also have the option to fill out the form manually, but Schwartz said taking advantage of Elli is preferred. 

The Well also offers a small, vetted cohort of matchmakers if users wish to open their profile to them. Daters can also book an individual phone session with a matchmaker for $180, but otherwise the app is entirely free of charge. 

A team of about a dozen advisors and matchmakers has been involved since the app’s inception, including two Modern Orthodox rabbis: Rabbi Elie Weinstock, senior rabbi of the Jewish Center of Atlantic Beach on Long Island, and Rabbi Daniel Kraus, director of community education at Congregation Kehilath Jeshurun in Manhattan. 

“The future of Jewish dating isn’t choosing between technology and people,” Kraus told JI. “It’s combining the best of both. There are many excellent dating apps today. But no single platform can serve every community equally well. Every week I meet remarkable young adults who are ready to build Jewish homes, yet many still struggle to meet the right person. The challenge isn’t a lack of commitment. It’s creating meaningful opportunities for the right introductions.”

“The Well’s model is especially compelling because it pairs the scale and intelligence of technology with the wisdom, intuition and personal touch of experienced shadchanim [matchmakers],” continued Kraus. “Technology broadens the possibilities. People bring the judgment that no algorithm can fully replicate.” 

The name itself, said Kraus, is “deeply rooted in Jewish tradition.” 

“Throughout Tanach, wells are places where lives change,” he said. “Rivkah, Rachel and Tzipporah each met their future spouse at a well. While the platform is new, the mission is timeless: to help more young Jews find one another and build the next generation of Jewish families.” 

The Well features two levels of profiles: public and private. The private one is only seen by Elli or a matchmaker. There’s also a dashboard where matchmakers can discuss the profiles of their clients so they can make suggestions in addition to the ones Elli makes. 

Names are drawn for users every Monday and Thursday — the days biblical Jews traditionally went to the market — and they have a certain amount of time to respond; they can say “pass” or can choose to start a conversation. They can also share someone’s profile with another user in their “village,” which is the equivalent of Facebook friends. 

“Some of that we’re fine tuning to make sure we’re not infringing on privacy,” said Schwartz, adding that the platform uses vanishing pictures to ensure profiles aren’t screenshotted and sent around.

Since dating apps first launched in the 2010s, they have instantly put hundreds of profiles at users’ fingertips, making them the favored method for nearly half of Americans looking for love, according to a Forbes Health survey. But apps that claim credit for matches made five or ten years ago now face user burnout, with many people saying they prefer to meet in person rather than swipe through an endless pool of potential mates. Seventy-eight percent of users report dating app burnout, according to another Forbes survey conducted last year.    

Addressing this, Schwartz said The Well also features an events section of the app that will advertise social gatherings for this demographic across the country. She described that as a “crucial” component. 

Before officially going live, The Well hosted an invitation-only launch event Tuesday night at the swanky Bowery Hotel on Manhattan’s Lower East Side, timed to coincide with Tu B’Av, drawing some 200 young professionals eager to mingle and learn about the app.  

“What makes The Well stand out is that it rejects the culture of infinite swiping and disposable connections,” Erez Kahan, a 35-year-old who works as a relationship manager in the family office space and attended the launch event, told JI. “Instead, by thoughtfully introducing just a couple of carefully considered matches each week, it encourages people to slow down, be present and give each connection the attention it deserves. It’s a refreshingly human approach — one that values individualized care, quality over quantity and genuine intention over endless choice.”

Kahan, a graduate of The Frisch School, a Modern Orthodox school in New Jersey, said he’s particularly drawn to the symbolism behind The Well’s name — something he expressed hope to experience through the app: “A chance meeting at a well became something guided by purpose rather than endless searching.”