‘Phone Swap’ Returns To Snapchat For Second Season

Phone Swap, a modern twist on the game show dating genre popularized by Chuck Barris with the ABC show The Dating Game, returns to Snapchat Tuesday for a second season.

The game invites two strangers to exchange phones before deciding whether to go on a date. One person leaves the room while the other inspects photos and other revealing details stored on the device. Then, the process is reversed.

The couple reunites in a room to decide, based on what they’ve learned about the other person, whether to go out.

“The focus is on the phone and how, in the modern world, it’s the equivalent of people’s diaries. It’s where you keep your secrets,” said Tom Wright, chief executive of Elisabeth Murdoch’s Vertical Networks, the show’s Venice-based creator.

Snap has been expanding its investment in original content, as rivals like Twitter, Facebook and YouTube invest more deeply in programming.

Phone Swap resonates with Snapchat’s millennial users, who’ve come of age in an era of dating apps like Tinder and Bumble and reality shows like The Bachelor. Phone Swap attracted an average of about 10 million viewers an episode in its first season, and reached a peak audience of 14 million.

“Millions of Snapchatters became loyal viewers of season one of Phone Swap, making the decision to bring the Show back for a second season an easy one,” said Sean Mills, Snap’s head of original content.

The first episode of Phone Swap premieres at 6 a.m. Eastern Time Tuesday. New episodes will air twice a week, at 6 a.m. on Tuesdays and Thursdays, through Thursday, April 5. Then, shows move to once a week, airing every Tuesday, beginning April 10.

Phone Swap is available on Snapchat’s Discover page.