MTV’s New Dating Show Will Film Contestants Totally Nude

MTV is venturing into the nude dating scene for American viewers.

The network's upcoming dating show, Dating Naked, is currently in the works, according to Collider, and will be filmed early next year.

The blurb for Dating Naked — a reboot of an American reality dating show that first aired on VH1 in July 2014 — described the show as "a new social experiment [that] provides daters with a radical dating experience where before they bare their souls they bare everything else first," per Collider.

Dating Naked: Germany — which features non-pixelated, full-frontal nudity — premiered in February 2023 and is currently available on Paramount+ in Germany.

According to Collider, MTV executives are currently searching for "body-confident extroverts" who are interested in spending a few weeks filming in a tropical paradise setting with other nude contestants.

"This show is really going to push the boundaries, it's like Naked Attraction meets Love Island — so fans of both series will be in for a treat," a source told The Sun. "Finding love isn't the only incentive for potential contestants — there will also be a huge cash prize for the winner. But the contestants will have to be seriously at one with nature because they'll be filmed nude for pretty much the entire time they’re on the show.”

This isn't the first nude dating show to hit American television screens.

The U.K. dating show Naked Attraction has surged in popularity since landing on Max in September because American viewers are shocked over the premise.

Naked Attraction is "dating in reverse" and allows a clothed "chooser" to see their potential dates fully nude before agreeing to go out with them. The potential suitors begin standing naked in frosted glass cases and gradually reveal their bodies to the chooser, who eliminates them in each round. When it gets down to the two final suitors, the chooser also gets naked before deciding who they want to go out with.

So why is full-frontal nudity on television now allowed in the United States?

Naked Attraction nudity remains because the show is streaming on Max, which is a premium streaming service. The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) partially regulates United States broadcast networks and thus has strict rules about nudity and language. Naked Attraction would never be shown in full on any of the big four networks because of the FCC fines, and those networks depend on advertising dollars to stay in business.

The FCC does not regulate premium streaming services like Max, though, because they are subscription-based. People are choosing to pay for that content, and it is not funded or supported by the government. It's up to user discretion to put up parental controls or prevent their children from watching content they deem to be inappropriate.