Hello Group Q1 2026 Earnings Call Transcript

Quartr
Provided by Quartr
June 2, 2026

Key Takeaways

  • Negative Sentiment: Total Q1 revenue fell 5% year over year to RMB 2.39 billion, as domestic weakness outweighed strong overseas growth. Adjusted operating income was roughly flat at RMB 349 million, with margin holding at 14.6%.
  • Negative Sentiment: Domestic revenue declined 15% year over year amid tighter tax scrutiny on Momo-related agencies, softer consumer sentiment, and lower Tantan paying users. Management said the tax-related pressure was most severe in March through May and expects improvement later in the year.
  • Neutral Sentiment: Overseas revenue grew 44% year over year to RMB 597 million and rose to 25% of group revenue, driven by diversified product expansion. Management reiterated confidence that full-year overseas revenue can reach about RMB 3 billion.
  • Positive Sentiment: MENA new products continued to scale quickly, with Yaahlan approaching break-even and amar reaching positive marginal contribution for the first time. Management said both businesses are growing with improving margins and are being scaled in an ROI-driven way.
  • Positive Sentiment: AI remains a key product and monetization lever, with features like AI chat assist and AI voice drift bottles already showing promise. The company plans to extend its AI stack across Momo, Tantan, and new products, and said AI spending should be high return rather than a major near-term profit drag.
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Earnings Conference Call
Hello Group Q1 2026
00:00 / 00:00

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Operator

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by, and welcome to Hello Group's First Quarter 2026 Earnings Conference Call. If you wish to ask a question, you will need to press the star key followed by the number one on your telephone keypad. Please note this conference is being recorded today. I would now like to hand the conference over to your first speaker today, Ms. Ashley Jing. Thank you. Please go ahead, ma'am.

Ashley Jing
Ashley Jing
Head of Investor Relations at Hello Group

Thank you, operator. Good morning and good evening, everyone. Thank you for joining us today for Hello Group's First Quarter 2026 Earnings Conference Call. The company's results were released earlier today and are available on the company's IR website. On the call today are Mr. Yan Tang, CEO of the company, Ms. Zhang Sichuan, COO of the company, and Ms. Peng Hui, CFO of the company. They will discuss the company's business operations and highlights, as well as the financials and guidance. They will all be available to answer your questions during the Q&A session that follows. As we begin, I would like to remind you that this call may contain forward-looking statements made under the safe harbor provision of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995.

Ashley Jing
Ashley Jing
Head of Investor Relations at Hello Group

Such statements are based on management's current expectations and current market and operating conditions, and relate to events that involve known or unknown risks, uncertainties, and other factors. All of which are difficult to predict, and many of which are beyond the company's control, which may cause the company's actual results, performance, or achievements to differ materially from those in the forward-looking statements. Further information regarding this and other risks, uncertainties, and factors is included in the company's filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. The company does not undertake any obligation to update any forward-looking statements as a result of new information, future events, or otherwise, except as required under law. I will now pass the call over to our CEO, Ms. Zhang Sichuan. Ms. Zhang, please.

Sichuan Zhang
Sichuan Zhang
COO at Hello Group

Thank you, Ashley. Hello, everyone. Thank you for joining today's call. The group maintained steady business momentum in Q1, guided by the strategic priorities set last year. Our domestic business stayed healthy through focused product innovation and refined operations despite external pressures. Leveraging the synergy of a diversified product portfolio, our overseas business has remained a positive trend. Looking ahead, we are fully confident in each business line to continue to advance along the strategic roadmap in 2026. I'll walk you through the key updates. Starting with the financials. For Q1 2026, total group revenue was RMB 2.39 billion, down 5% year-over-year. Domestic revenue reached RMB 1.79 billion, down 15% year-over-year. Overseas revenue was RMB 597 million, up 44% year-over-year. Overseas revenue accounted for 25%, compared to 16% in the same period last year.

Sichuan Zhang
Sichuan Zhang
COO at Hello Group

Adjusted operating income was RMB 349 million, up 1% year-over-year, with a margin of 14.6%. Building on the strategic direction from 2025, our 2026 priorities continue along three main tracks. For Momo, the goal is to ensure stable, sustained productivity of our cash cow business. For Tantan, to continue exploring a dating experience and efficient business model tailored for Asian users. For our new businesses, to deepen overseas presence, enrich our brand portfolio, and build a long-term growth engine. Let me walk you through each, starting with Momo. On the product side, our key focus in recent years has been to optimize user experience and stabilize our user base. This year, we have continued to refine the chat experience. Our Knock Knock feature improves connection accuracy by analyzing users' historical chat patterns to optimize matching algorithms, driving sustained growth in two-way and in-depth chats.

Sichuan Zhang
Sichuan Zhang
COO at Hello Group

In real-time chat scenarios, building on a steady ramp-up of voice features, we have also introduced video features to enrich our portfolio of instant interactions. The combined upgrades in our group recommendation and product experience have lowered the barrier for users to find chat partners. This is the main driver behind the steady improvement in retention among existing users. In 2025, we undertook a number of meaningful explorations in leveraging AI to improve users' social efficiency with encouraging initial results. For example, our AI greetings and AI chat assist features improved the female users' experience. This drove higher reply rates from male users and more in-depth conversation overall. In Q1, the product team explored AI-driven innovations such as voice-driven bottles, guiding users complete voice profiles, auto-generating voice content, and releasing it onto the platform in a message in a bottle format to spark users' desire to connect.

Sichuan Zhang
Sichuan Zhang
COO at Hello Group

For user acquisition, Channel ROI has remained fully profitable since the beginning of the year. Ongoing audio room gameplay updates and better channel conversion lifted payment intent among mid and small spending users. This drove steady LTV growth and channel ROI improved moderately quarter-over-quarter. Acquisition spend continued a refined, disciplined approach, narrowing slightly from last quarter. This is worth noting that Q1 was affected by the Chinese New Year, as some users shifted their social time to offline gathering and close friends and family. This temporary pullback platform activity and paying scale, with Momo's paying users decreasing by 200,000 quarter-over-quarter to 3.7 million. Thanks to a year of product refinement focused on chat experience, organic traffic grew compared to last year, and retention among existing users improved slightly.

Sichuan Zhang
Sichuan Zhang
COO at Hello Group

During the Chinese New Year, the team ran targeted operational events at a low point of the cycle, narrowing the decline in user activity compared to past holidays. As a result, the post-holiday recovery was meaningfully better than in the same period last year. This set a solid foundation for stabilizing our user base over the full year. Turning to Momo's commercial performance. In Q1, Momo's revenue was RMB 1.52 billion, down 15% year-over-year and 9% quarter-over-quarter. The year-over-year decline mainly reflects the ongoing impact of the new tax regulation and stricter local enforcement that came into effect in the second half of 2025. The motivation of some high-grossing agencies and broadcasters is still recovering. The sequential decline was largely seasonal, driven by the Chinese New Year, alongside persistently soft consumer spending sentiment.

Sichuan Zhang
Sichuan Zhang
COO at Hello Group

In response to this external shift, the teams continued to direct gameplay innovation and operational resources towards mid-tier and long-tail users, keeping revenue from audio scenarios and social games such as Parking Wars relatively resilient. This helped partially absorb the external pressure on overall revenue. On the product and operation side, our live streaming business organized a series of user-oriented events during the Chinese New Year, effectively cushioning the dilution of online behavior from the long holiday. As a result, the post-holiday recovery in key operational metrics, including user engagement, paying conversion rate, and streamer return rate, was meaningfully stronger than in the same period last year. At the same time, we continued to introduce and selectively support high-quality talent streamer, lifting organic revenue through content quality improvements. In audio scenarios, we roll out the new PK game play to further motivate users to gift one another.

Sichuan Zhang
Sichuan Zhang
COO at Hello Group

With some mid-tier and long-tail broadcasters and agencies on our platform facing ongoing profit pressure during the tax compliance process, we have rolled out a new incentive-based revenue-sharing policy. This is decided to enable the quality performance to deliver greater value to the platform while ensuring they make stable income in turn. Now let's turn to Tantan. As of the end of Q1, Tantan had 0.6 million paying users, a modest decrease of 30,000 quarter-over-quarter. This decline was driven by two factors. First, the carryover from ongoing MAU decline, and second, Alipay's changes to its auto-renewal paying billing rules, which placed short-term pressure on membership conversion. Under the continued effect of our strategic marketing cuts, Tantan's user base remained on the downward trajectory, though the magnitude of decline has narrowed meaningfully.

Sichuan Zhang
Sichuan Zhang
COO at Hello Group

Through algorithm innovation and refined operations, engagement, and retention among younger users showed slight improvements, contributing positive to user base stability. On the product side, the team optimized recommendation strategies in our core swipe-based scenario. For example, we introduced tiered restrictions on female users' metrics, allowing only horizontal or upward matching, a benefit for female users through our social expectations. This drove a near three percentage point increase in average swipe per female user, slightly improving the retention. On new scenario exploration, we piloted map-based, social, and AI chat assist features. On user acquisition, although the year-over-year reduction in channel investment led to a lower required volume, the meaningful narrowing the unit acquisition cost partially offset the impact. Additionally, because organic traffic outperformed channel traffic on both user engagement and retention, the overall decline in our user base was far smaller than the channel-driven declines implied by our strategic cuts.

Sichuan Zhang
Sichuan Zhang
COO at Hello Group

Sequentially, both spend and user acquisition costs narrowed by various degrees. The channel volume decline was relatively limited. While Alipay's new rule policy created new near-term ARPU pressure, channel ROI was sustained well above 100% throughout the quarter. On the financial side in Q1, Tantan's domestic business generated RMB 125 million in revenue, down 25% year-over-year and 8% quarter-over-quarter. The primary driver remains MAU contraction leading to fewer paying users, compounded by the short-term impact of Alipay's policy adjustments on various payments. On monetization, the team unbundled membership features into a la carte offerings while enriching Flash Chats game playing and stepping up in-app promotion to ease top-line pressure. On profitability, thanks to ongoing cuts in channel investment and personnel costs, net profits grew significantly year-over-year. Lastly, our new businesses.

Sichuan Zhang
Sichuan Zhang
COO at Hello Group

Our 2026 goal carries forward from 2025 to deepen our overseas presence, enrich our brand portfolio, and build a long-term growth engine. In Q1, overseas revenue totaled RMB 597 million, up 44% year-over-year with a slight 2% sequential decline. Overseas now accounted for 25% of group revenue compared to 16% in the same period last year. The sequential softness was mainly due to some external challenges Soulchill faced during the quarter, which weighted on our overseas business overall. Excluding Soulchill, the rest of our overseas businesses continued to deliver healthy growth this quarter, further validating the value of diversified product portfolio in dispensing risk from single product volatility. Our two newer product in MENA, Yaahlan and Amar, continued their rapid growth trajectory with both delivering triple-digit revenue growth year-over-year in Q1.

Sichuan Zhang
Sichuan Zhang
COO at Hello Group

Driven by continuously improving localized operations, a more precise grasp of local user preferences, and sustained gameplay innovation, both products saw concurrent improvement in revenue and profit. This quarter, Yaahlan is approaching net income break even, and Amar achieved positive marginal contribution for the first time. This is a significant milestone making our shift in MENA from a social-dominated model to a multi-product portfolio. Beyond our audio and video social products in MENA region, our dating business focused on developed markets is another important pillar of our overseas footprint. Also deliver satisfying progress this quarter. Tantan International, led by our Singapore team, completed a full upgrade of product positioning and branding over the past year. In second half of 2025, began migrating from a shared domestic international app build to a standalone overseas app.

Sichuan Zhang
Sichuan Zhang
COO at Hello Group

The migration was completed in Q1 with 99% of paying users successfully transferred, minimizing the revenue impact of the version split. Starting in Q2, the team's focus will turn to further optimizing product experience and improving monetization efficiency. Separately, Happn, which joined the group last year, has continued a steady, healthy growth trajectory since the beginning of this year. Happn's user base has remained relatively stable over the past year, and both sequential and year-over-year revenue growth came mainly from improvements in paid conversion rate and app pull. Reflecting greater efficiencies in operating the existing user base. In Q1, we began testing Happn's entry into new markets, laying the foundation for the brand's mid to long-term growth. As a relatively newer segment for our overseas front, we remain confident in the dating business' continued release of growth potential in 2026. This concludes my remarks.

Sichuan Zhang
Sichuan Zhang
COO at Hello Group

Now let me pass the call to Cathy for the financial review. Cathy, please.

Hui Peng
Hui Peng
CFO at Hello Group

Thanks, Sic. Hello, everyone. Thank you for joining our conference call today. Now let me take you through the financial review. Total revenue for the first quarter 2026 was RMB 2.39, down 5% year-on-year and 7% quarter-on-quarter. Non-GAAP net income attributable to the shareholders of the company was RMB 328.8 million compared to RMB 403.8 million in the same period of 2025, and RMB 281.3 million in the previous quarter. Looking into the key revenue items for Q1. Total revenue for value-added services for the first quarter of 2026 was RMB 2.35 billion, down 6% year-on-year and 7% quarter-on-quarter. On a geographic basis, PRC mainland value-added service revenue was RMB 1.76 billion, down 15% year-over-year and 9% quarter-over-quarter.

Hui Peng
Hui Peng
CFO at Hello Group

The decrease was primarily due to heightened tax scrutiny on the agencies for Momo's entertainment business, combined with softened consumer sentiments amid broader macro pressure, and to a lesser degree, a decline in paying users on Tantan. VAS overseas revenue reached RMB 593.7 million, up 44% year-over-year, driven by the rapid expansion of our diversified product portfolio. Overseas VAS revenue decreased slightly by 2% sequentially due to seasonal factor, namely Ramadan, as well as some external challenges in MENA area during the quarter. Turning to cost and expenses. Non-GAAP cost of revenue for the first quarter of 2026 was RMB 1.46 billion compared to RMB 1.57 billion for the same period last year. Non-GAAP gross margin for the quarter was 38.8% compared to 37.9% from year-ago period. Gross profit margin or GPM in Q1 2026 rose by around one percentage point YoY.

Hui Peng
Hui Peng
CFO at Hello Group

The increase was primarily driven by improved margins in MENA products after lowering the revenue sharing ratio to promote quality growth, together with a greater revenue mix from higher margin overseas dating products. This was partially offset by decline in Momo's GPM resulted from increased payout ratio to agencies in order to cushion the impact from the tax scrutiny. Non-GAAP R&D expenses for the first quarter was RMB 165.2 million compared to RMB 185.9 million for the same period last year, representing an 11% decrease year wide. The decrease was due to overall labor cost savings from the optimization of our personnel structure. Non-GAAP R&D expenses as a percentage of revenue was 7%, same as Q1 last year. We ended the quarter with 1,396 total employees, compared to 1,336 from a year ago.

Hui Peng
Hui Peng
CFO at Hello Group

The R&D personnel as a percentage of total employee for the group was 56%, compared with 58% from Q1 last year. Non-GAAP sales and marketing expenses for the first quarter was RMB 335.4 million, compared to RMB 322.1 million for the same period last year, representing a 14% and a 13% of total revenue, respectively. The year-over-year increase in sales and marketing expenses was mainly driven by increased marketing investments in our new overseas apps. This was partially offset by continued cost control in our PRC mainland operations, as both Momo and Tantan reduced marketing spend, while Soulchill also temporarily scaled back channel investments amid external challenges. Non-GAAP G&A expenses was RMB 89.4 million for the first quarter, compared to RMB 114.8 million for the same period last year, representing a 4% and 5% of total revenue, respectively.

Hui Peng
Hui Peng
CFO at Hello Group

The decrease in G&A expenses was primarily attributable to a high base effect in Q1 2025, resulting from a self-inspection related to tax matters. Non-GAAP operating income was RMB 349.2 million, representing a margin of 14.6%, compared with RMB 345.3 million and a margin of 13.7% from Q1 2025. The increase was driven by improvement in GPM. Non-GAAP OpEx as a percentage of total revenue stood at 25%, unchanged from the year-ago period. Briefly on income tax expenses. Total non-GAAP income tax expenses was RMB 81.5 million for the quarter, with an effective tax rate of 20%. In Q1, the company accrued withholding income tax of RMB 21.2 million, which is 10% of undistributed profit generated by our WFOE. Without the withholding tax, our estimated non-GAAP effective tax rate was around 15% in the first quarter. Turning to balance sheet and cash flow items.

Hui Peng
Hui Peng
CFO at Hello Group

As of March 31st, 2026, Hello Group's cash equivalents, short-term deposits, long-term deposits, short-term investments, and restricted cash totaled RMB 8.56 billion, compared to RMB 8.68 billion as of December 31st, 2025. Net cash provided by operating activities in the first quarter of 2026 was RMB 158.9 million. The difference between operating net cash and Non-GAAP net income was mainly due to a significant increase in accounts receivable caused by temporary payment collection delays on one of our apps, as well as higher other current liabilities from the accrual of year-end bonuses and the 13th-month payroll. Lastly, on business outlook. We estimated our second quarter revenue to come in the range from RMB 2.45 billion-RMB 2.55 billion, representing a decrease of 6.5%-2.7% year-on-year.

Hui Peng
Hui Peng
CFO at Hello Group

This is based on the assumption that at midpoint, on a year-over-year basis, revenue from our mainland China business would decline by high teens percentage-wise, while overseas revenue is expected to grow by high 50s percentage-wise. Please be mindful that this forecast represents the company's current and preliminary view on the market and operational conditions, which are subject to change. That concluded our prepared portion of today's discussion. With that, let me turn the call back to Ashley to start Q&A. Ashley, please.

Ashley Jing
Ashley Jing
Head of Investor Relations at Hello Group

Just a quick reminder for those who can speak Chinese, please ask your questions in Chinese first, followed by English translation by yourself. Please also limit the number of questions to a maximum of two. Operator, we're ready for questions, please. Thank you.

Operator

Thank you. If you wish to ask a question, please press star one on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. If you wish to cancel your request, please press star two. If you are on a speakerphone, please pick up the handset to ask your question. Your first question today comes from Xueqing Zhang with CICC. Please go ahead.

Xueqing Zhang
Xueqing Zhang
Analyst at CICC

Thanks. Thanks, management, for taking my question. My question is about the overseas business. Regarding the MENA business, she mentioned in her prepared remarks that Soulchill faced some challenges from external factors in the first quarter. Could management provide more details on what happened, and will this have any impact on the full-year revenue outlook for the overseas business? She also mentioned that the two new products continue to see relative revenue growth while the losses kept narrowing. Could management share when this new business is expected to turn profitable? Going forward, will the company continue to increase marketing investments to scale these products, or will you focus more on narrowing losses and moving toward profitability? Thank you.

Ashley Jing
Ashley Jing
Head of Investor Relations at Hello Group

Let me start with what was dragging Soulchill down in Q1. The sequential revenue decline came down to three main things. Number one is the Turkish government tightened regulation on social and streaming apps, which temporarily resulted in a blanket removal of all related products across the industry. That created a headwind for us in terms of new user acquisition in Turkey. Number two is seasonality. Consumer sentiment in the MENA region during Ramadan was relatively softer. As a large and rather mature product, Soulchill was more noticeably impacted by this seasonal kind of headwinds. Number three is the ongoing conflict in the Middle East. That has also had some drag on Soulchill's revenue in the Gulf region.

Yan Tang
Yan Tang
CEO at Hello Group

[Non-English content]

Ashley Jing
Ashley Jing
Head of Investor Relations at Hello Group

We are confident that Soulchill fully compliant with all applicable Turkish laws and regulations governing social platforms. Our team is actively working with the relevant authorities to bring the app back to the App Store as soon as possible. In the meantime, we are accelerating localization efforts in other markets to offset the temporary impact from Turkey. Soulchill's business has already begun to see a steady recovery from the Q1 low. We do not believe investors need to be overly concerned about it.

Yan Tang
Yan Tang
CEO at Hello Group

[Non-English content]

Ashley Jing
Ashley Jing
Head of Investor Relations at Hello Group

The other two new MENA products had a strong Q1, triple-digit year-over-year revenue growth with losses narrowing rapidly. As the business has scaled, the team has been able to gradually adjust the revenue-sharing structure, driving meaningful and sustained growth margin improvement over the past year. We have selectively increasing marketing spends where ROI targets are being met, and are actively testing new markets while keeping the loss trajectory moving in the right direction each quarter. Our path for these two MENA products is pretty clear: build scale first, optimize the growth margin structure, keep marketing ROI-driven, and let net profitability flow naturally. Yaahlan should keep net profitability within a quarter. Amar is about half a year behind on that trajectory. For the full year overseas revenue outlook, I will hand it over to Cathy.

Hui Peng
Hui Peng
CFO at Hello Group

Okay. Let me first break the overseas outlook into three separate pieces. First is our flagship overseas app, Soulchill. As Zhang Sichuan mentioned earlier, Soulchill was under some pressure in Q1, mainly due to regulatory changes in Turkey, as well as the prolonged geopolitical tensions in parts of the Middle East. That said, I think the team has adapted reasonably well to the changing environment. While revenue in Turkey remains somewhat pressured, performance in other Middle Eastern markets has actually been quite solid. Overall, I would say that Soulchill, particularly in the first half of the year, is likely to come in a bit below our original expectations, but the business itself remains fundamentally healthy. If you look at the second piece, for the two newer social entertainment apps we've been scaling in the MENA region, their trends are actually developing very much in line with our plans.

Hui Peng
Hui Peng
CFO at Hello Group

Third, for the dating and membership-oriented business outside of the MENA region, that part of the portfolio has remained very much on track. Honestly, that's one of the things that makes dating a membership business model pretty attractive. Compared with entertainment-driven platforms, the revenue visibility and forecasting clarity are generally much higher. Putting these three pieces together, if you recall what we said on the last earnings call, we mentioned that overseas revenue for 2025 was, I think, somewhere around RMB 2 billion. This year, for 2026, we are likely to hit RMB 3 billion milestone. At this point, our overall view really hasn't changed materially. Depending on how market expansion progresses across different regions, there could still be somewhere around RMB 100 million of variation, either to the upside or to the downside of that RMB 3 billion number.

Hui Peng
Hui Peng
CFO at Hello Group

Based on what we see today, we remain pretty comfortable with that original range. Hopefully that answers your question. Back to Ashley for the question.

Ashley Jing
Ashley Jing
Head of Investor Relations at Hello Group

Hi. Operator, the next question, please.

Operator

Thank you. Your next question comes from Thomas Chong with Jefferies. Please go ahead.

Thomas Chong
Thomas Chong
Analyst at Jefferies

[Non-English content] Hi, good evening. Thanks management for taking my question. In Q1, we saw domestic revenue declined by 15% year-on-year, and the year-on-year decline widened versus 2025. Management comments this is related to the new tax rules which affect Momo. May I understand when should we expect these external factors to be fully digested? On the other hand, management comments Alipay automatic renewal has some changes which need to short term impact to Tantan conversion. Can management comments about the scope for this adjustment and how long will it last? Should we expect this will affect Momo and other subscription products as well? Lastly, how should we think about the full year outlook for the domestic revenue? Thank you.

Yan Tang
Yan Tang
CEO at Hello Group

[Non-English content]

Ashley Jing
Ashley Jing
Head of Investor Relations at Hello Group

Let me first address the impact of tax policies on Momo. New tax regulations introduced in the second half of 2025, combined with stricter local tax collection and enforcement, affected agencies operating chat room scenario. To alleviate the pressure on the supply side, we moderately adjusted the revenue sharing ratios for key agencies in the latter half of last year, which yield positive results for those impacted. However, tax authorities further tightened their policies targeting agencies in early 2026, resulting in a decline in agency related revenue during March and April. In response, we selected a group of high-quality agencies in mid-May and began assisting them with tax compliance. To help offset the profit pressure caused by additional compliance costs, we introduced a new incentive program and provided further financial support to these selected agencies.

Ashley Jing
Ashley Jing
Head of Investor Relations at Hello Group

Since late May, both operational enthusiasm and revenue among these agencies have rebounded actually rapidly. We expect their performance to return to normal level by Q3.

Yan Tang
Yan Tang
CEO at Hello Group

[Non-English content]

Ashley Jing
Ashley Jing
Head of Investor Relations at Hello Group

As for when Momo will return to year-over-year growth, beyond the tax issue, it also depends on when broader consumer sentiment picks back up. What we can control is making sure the product fundamentals are rock solid and operating efficiency is maximized. We are very confident in Momo's monetization capabilities.

Yan Tang
Yan Tang
CEO at Hello Group

[Non-English content]

Ashley Jing
Ashley Jing
Head of Investor Relations at Hello Group

On the Alipay auto-renewal policy changes, yes, this did impact Tantan's membership business in Q1, primarily manifesting as a temporary decline in renewal rates, and resulting in some subscriber churn. The team actually responded swiftly. On the monetization side, we launched an unbundling strategy, separating high-frequency perks that were previously bundled into membership packages, such as Super Likes and Boosts, and offering them as standalone purchases. We have also enhanced our a la carte pay-as-you-go features, like Flash Chats, to help offset the headwinds in membership renewals. In addition, we are diversifying payment channels, encouraging users to shift towards less affected options, and promoting longer-term membership plans.

Yan Tang
Yan Tang
CEO at Hello Group

[Non-English content]

Ashley Jing
Ashley Jing
Head of Investor Relations at Hello Group

In terms of scope, the Alipay policy changes primarily affected subscription or membership products. Momo's core payment model is based on consumable virtual gifts, which do not rely on auto-renewal, the impact is actually quite minimal. Our overseas business uses App Store or Google Play payment channels, which remain unaffected. Overall, this is a relatively contained issue, primarily impacting only Tantan's domestic membership business. On timing, we expect the impact to be concentrated in the first half of the year, with the situation gradually improving in the second half as we diversify payment channels and membership structures. For the full-year domestic revenue outlook, I will hand it over to Cathy.

Hui Peng
Hui Peng
CFO at Hello Group

Okay. Time for an update on how we are thinking about the revenue outlook for the rest of 2026. I will, as in previous quarters, use the same framework, which is set upon three key elements: the macro environment, the regulatory environment, and our own platform fundamentals. Along those lines, starting with the macro side, honestly, consumer sentiment looks largely unchanged from what we saw at the end of last year, and through Q1. It remains relatively soft, importantly, we are not seeing any meaningful deterioration either. On the regulatory front, this is really where most of the incremental pressure came from in Q1 and Q2. You are right that the year-over-year decline in Q1 widened versus last year. If you look at our Q2 guidance, the domestic revenue decline is expected to widen further from Q1's level.

Hui Peng
Hui Peng
CFO at Hello Group

The main reason is tighter tax scrutiny on some of the small and medium-sized agencies in our ecosystem, which hit March, April, and early May particularly hard. In response, we rolled out new agency incentive policies to encourage tax compliance. The goal here is very straightforward. We want to maintain the long-term health and stability of the content ecosystem and continue supporting the agencies that create the most value on the platform. Since rolling out these measures in late May, we've already started seeing encouraging feedback and some improvement in operating trends. We do expect June performance to benefit from these adjustments. That said, April and May were clearly impacted by the tightened regulatory environment, and that pressure is reflected in our Q2 guidance. Some of the impact could still carry into Q3, but at this stage, we believe the most difficult period is likely behind us already.

Hui Peng
Hui Peng
CFO at Hello Group

Now turning to platform fundamentals, as Sic mentioned in the prepared remarks, the core business itself remains very solid. Outside of the regulatory pressure, there really hasn't been any material change in the underlying business fundamentals compared with what we saw in Q1. Looking into the second half of the year, we still expect the year-over-year decline rate to narrow meaningfully. Part of this is because the regulatory impact should gradually normalize as the year progresses, and part of it is simply because the comparison base becomes significantly easier in the second half of 2025. For the second half, we still expect the domestic business decline rate to improve to somewhere below 15% year-over-year. That said, given the additional disruption that we saw in the first half from tax tightening, we are modestly adjusting our full year outlook.

Hui Peng
Hui Peng
CFO at Hello Group

Previously, we were guiding to a low teens decline for the domestic business. Based on what we see so far happen in the first half, we now expect the full year decline to be closer to somewhere around mid-teens year-over-year. That's how we are currently thinking about the domestic revenue outlook. Back to Ashley, maybe for one more question.

Ashley Jing
Ashley Jing
Head of Investor Relations at Hello Group

Yeah. In the interest of time, let's just take one last question before we close the line. We're ready. Thank you, operator.

Operator

Thank you. Your next question comes from Jenny Yuan with UBS. Please go ahead.

Jenny Yuan
Jenny Yuan
Analyst at UBS

[Non-English content]

Jenny Yuan
Jenny Yuan
Analyst at UBS

Let me translate myself. Management has highlighted AI-driven product innovation in several releases over the past year. Ranging from AI-powered ice-breaking feature, AI assistant chat features, to the newly launched AI voice message drift bottles this quarter. Could you please share more details on the group's AI product roadmap going forward? More broadly, how do you view the contribution of AI innovation to our longer-term money growth? Should we expect any meaningful impact on near-term profitability from AI investment? Given the external challenges faced by both domestic and overseas business at the end of the year, how do we expect the group's full year profit outlook and margin to capture a full year? Thank you.

Yan Tang
Yan Tang
CEO at Hello Group

[Non-English content]

Ashley Jing
Ashley Jing
Head of Investor Relations at Hello Group

AI is particularly meaningful for a company like ours, where social products are the core. The essence of our product features and recommendation logic is to lower the barriers for users to form connections, and enable long-term and effective interactions, and deliver emotional value. AI is a tool that can genuinely transform the user experience in this space.

Yan Tang
Yan Tang
CEO at Hello Group

[Non-English content]

Ashley Jing
Ashley Jing
Head of Investor Relations at Hello Group

Based on what we have built so far, AI is advancing in two distinct directions on the product side. First, enhancing connections between users by breaking the ice and lowering social barriers. Examples include our AI-assisted chat features and the AI voice drift bottle, which we are currently testing. The concept is that AI guides users to provide basic profile information through voice input, and then automatically generates more vivid and engaging self-introduction and greetings using the user's actual voice. This is then published on the platform as a drift bottle. These AI tools are particularly valuable for users who have dating needs, but relatively weaker social skills. Second, enabling new products formats. For example, Donut is fully AI-powered voice social product that has already begun monetization in China.

Ashley Jing
Ashley Jing
Head of Investor Relations at Hello Group

On the overseas side, our AI role-play dating app MiraiMind has shown solid early traction in Japan, and is now expanding to other Asian markets. These products represent our exploration of what next-generation social experience can look like.

Yan Tang
Yan Tang
CEO at Hello Group

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Ashley Jing
Ashley Jing
Head of Investor Relations at Hello Group

Regarding the impact of AI investment on profitability, our view is that AI spending is high return in nature. It directly improves user experience and drives higher propensity to pay. From an execution standpoint, AI's penetration across our products is still in a rapid expansion phase. Over the past year, we focused on refining the AI greeting and AI-assisted chat algorithm on the Momo platform. Going forward, we will be replicating that tech stack across more use cases, including AI agents for Momo live streaming, AI short dramas generation based on broadcasters' images, as well as smarter matching and content distribution on Tantan, and AI-assisted chatting features. This kind of horizontal reuse of the tech stack helps maximize the return on AI investment. For the group's full year profitability outlook, I'll pass it over to Cathy.

Hui Peng
Hui Peng
CFO at Hello Group

Okay. On profitability outlook, I'll just go back to the framework that we laid out at the beginning of the year on our March earnings call. Starting from the top line, if you combine our updated view on the domestic business with what I just discussed on the overseas side, we now expect group revenue for 2026 to see a slight year-over-year decline versus 2025, probably down by a couple of percentage points at the top level. At the beginning of the year, we also said that we were targeting adjusted operating margin in the low teens. Based on what we see today, that target still looks quite achievable. That said, because the domestic business faced additional pressure from the tax-related disruption in Q1 and the early part of Q2, our full year revenue outlook in absolute dollar terms is now somewhat lower than where we started the year.

Hui Peng
Hui Peng
CFO at Hello Group

Naturally, that creates more pressure in terms of absolute profit amounts. Internally, we are looking at additional opportunities to optimize spending wherever appropriate and necessary, whether on personnel side, marketing efficiency, or other operating areas where we believe we can improve productivity without affecting long-term growth initiatives. Overall, I would say that we remain broadly on track to achieve the profitability targets that we laid out at the beginning of the year. I think that wraps up the call. Now I'm handing back to Ashley for closing remarks.

Ashley Jing
Ashley Jing
Head of Investor Relations at Hello Group

Right. Thank you for participating today. That's going to be the end of the call, and we will see you next quarter. Thank you. Bye.

Hui Peng
Hui Peng
CFO at Hello Group

Thank you.

Operator

Thank you. That does conclude our conference for today. Thank you for participating. You may now disconnect.

Executives
    • Ashley Jing
      Ashley Jing
      Head of Investor Relations
    • Hui Peng
      Hui Peng
      CFO
    • Sichuan Zhang
      Sichuan Zhang
      COO
    • Yan Tang
      Yan Tang
      CEO
Analysts
    • Jenny Yuan
      Analyst at UBS
    • Thomas Chong
      Analyst at Jefferies
    • Xueqing Zhang
      Analyst at CICC
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