Bars, Pride and dating apps: How China is closing down its LGBT+ spaces

When two dating apps, Blued and Finka, disappeared from the Apple AppStore in China on November 11, a whole world threatened to disappear.

The apps are two of the most popular among China’s LGBT+ community. Blued had been downloaded tens of millions of times, according to the BBC. 

In taking them down, the authorities removed two major LGBT+ spaces, leaving little in their place.

“There are still some local apps available, but they are smaller, and they have limited circulation and popularity,” says Bao Hongwei, specialist in China’s queer culture at the University of Nottingham.

Apple said it removed the apps “based on an order from the Cyberspace Administration of China”.

‘A seismic change’

It is not the first time that the authorities have targeted gay dating apps. In 2022, the American app Grindr was retired in China.

The ban on Grindr could be put down to China’s wider dislike of Western apps, which are often accused of being vehicles for foreign influence. But removing Blued and Finka, which were both developed in China, represents a “seismic change in government attitudes towards homegrown LGBT apps”, says Hongwei.

“The Chinese government used to support the business of Blued,” Hongwei says. “The former Chinese Premier Li Keqiang, actually met with the CEO of Blued [in 2012] and it enjoyed a certain legitimacy.”

The disappearance of both Blued and Finka “will affect a lot of LGBT+ people's lives very significantly”, Hongwei adds. “It sends a chilling and very clear message to ordinary LGBT+ people that they can't pursue their own personal interests and desires.”

Erasing gay culture

Evidence of hardening attitudes towards the LGBT+ community in China has been increasing for some time. 

Before targeting Blued and Finka, the Chinese authorities led a campaign against authors of the “Boy's Love”, or Danmei, same-sex romance stories, some of which feature explicit love scenes between men.

Several Danmei writers, most of whom are female, have reported being arrested and questioned by the authorities, and in recent months two major Danmei sites have either shut down, or drastically reduced and toned down their content.

In September, a censored version of American-Australian horror film “Together” was released in China with a gay marriage scene digitally altered to show a heterosexual couple.

And in early 2024, China’s dominant social platform Weibo removed viral images of Chinese dancer and transgender icon Jin Xing waving a rainbow flag. 

Despite being a high-profile and immensely popular celebrity in China for years, venues across the country dropped performances by her dance troupe without explanation in January 2025. 

Read moreFrom Chinese army dancer to transgender icon: Jin Xing's extraordinary journey

‘Three No’s’

China decriminalised homosexuality in 1997 and officially recognised that it was not a mental illness in 2001. 

For a long time, China adopted a policy of Three No’s towards homosexuality: no approval, no disapproval and no promotion.

This allowed for a period of “good years in the 2000s where more people were openly gay", says Timothy Hildebrandt, specialist in social politics and sexuality in China at the London School of Economics.

Even so, gay and queer people in China have had to navigate murky legal waters in which their sexuality is legal, but they have no official protections. 

For example, while gay marriage is not recognised, a court in 2016 agreed to hear the case of a man suing local authorities for refusing to register his union with his male partner – a first in China. 

But the judge ultimately dismissed the case. 

Today, “officially, those Three No’s are still in place, but we are seeing evidence that the space for LGBT+ communities is starting to shrink”, says Marc Lanteigne, associate professor of political science at the Arctic University of Norway.

Shanghai Pride shut down in 2020, and one year later the government shut down student LGBT+ accounts for “violating internet regulations”. Grindr disappeared in 2022, and in 2023 the Beijing LGBT Centre closed its doors after 15 years.

In June 2024, the Roxie, Shanghai's last officially lesbian bar, was forced to close “under pressure from the authorities".

“The authorities have been slowly chipping away at those spaces that were open previously,” says Hildebrandt.

With the closure of so many physical spaces, online networks had become “really the only places in which many members of the LGBT+ community could express their sexuality openly” he adds. 

A collateral victim

Why is China’s LGBT+ community being targeted in this way? Rather than being specifically singled out, it is likely that it is a collateral victim of Xi Jinping’s notion of “common prosperity”. 

Historically, common prosperity has meant an effort by the Chinese Communist Party to promote economic and social equality. 

But in contemporary Chinese politics, “the Maoist principles about equality have more to do with uniformity,” says Hildebrandt. “You gain equality by being more like everybody else. You don't gain equality by being diverse.”

In a bid to create greater conformity within the population, “there has been a push in China to reinforce traditional family values and, in some cases, traditional masculine values,” adds Lanteigne.

At the same time, China’s population growth and economy are slowing. “The current population growth couldn't support economic growth,” explains Hongwei, meaning there has been a push to encourage heterosexual couples to have larger families to ensure an abundant future workforce.

In this context of wider policies to promote common prosperity, the LGBT+ community is not the only group facing repression, but it is an easy target. 

Since the Covid pandemic, “the Chinese government has endorsed nationalist discourse and LGBT culture is seen as very politicised siding with Western ideologies”, says Hongwei.

“There's the impression that LGBTQ communities are by default connected to the West and could be seen as destabilising forces,” adds Lanteigne.

Broader political and social forces may be at work, but the result is a real loss of liberty for gay and queer people in China. Hildebrandt says: “There is a real sense that it’s become a more difficult environment to be openly gay."

This article was adapted from the original in French.