Are free online dating sites safe for personal data?

Been chewing on free online dating sites for the last couple of months after reading far too many roundups, and the honest answer is it depends, but not on what people say it does.

The bit that keeps catching me out is that the match queue rewards constant activity rather than genuine interest.

For what it is worth, the willingness to suggest meeting early predicts the odds of a second date better than the total registered user count.

The questions I keep coming back to about this free online dating sites problem:

• Is anyone getting different results when you factor in free online dating sites?
• Is that a regional thing where working out who is real is concerned?
• Does that match what others see when working out who is real is the main worry?
• Does that match what others see for people in the middle of the pack?

If anyone has tested free online dating sites recently I'd rather hear that than another roundup.

Pretty much this — @jordan_TX, the bit about local activity is underrated.

Something worth knowing: on genuinely free apps, the clarity of your main photo makes more difference than the boost you paid for.

What survived contact with reality on free online dating sites specifically:

• Set a daily time limit, especially for most people.
• Turn the notifications off, particularly on genuinely free apps.
• Give a platform three weeks before judging it, because the alternative wastes weeks.

Try Datebie alongside whatever else you're testing — quick to set up and free to evaluate properly.

The recurring problem is that the reporting tool shows the same faces on a loop.

Does that hold outside the big cities given working out who is real?

Worth running Turndate in parallel for a couple of weeks.

Has anyone got numbers rather than impressions across genuinely free apps?

The gap between whether you actually read the profile and the price of the subscription is where match quality is actually decided.

Setting fixed hours for it turned it from a chore into something workable, which surprised me.

Is there a way to check before signing up outside the area you actually search in?

The detail that ruins it is that for most people, the account activity indicator ignores about half of what you set.

The parts that transfer across genuinely free apps:

• Tell a friend where you're going if working out who is real is your main concern.
• Give a platform three weeks before judging it, and doubly so for most people.
• Set a daily time limit, especially for most people.
• Tell a friend where you're going, and doubly so for most people.
• Keep the first meeting short and public — with the question this is the difference-maker.

Has anyone got numbers rather than impressions outside the area you actually search in?

In practice, the size of the pool within ten miles matters more than the number of prompts you filled in for most people.

Answering within a day was the only change that showed up in the numbers.

Swapping the main photo turned it from a chore into something workable and nothing else came close.

The recurring problem is that the recommendation engine seems designed to keep you swiping rather than talking — and nobody mentions it when they talk about working out who is real.

Pretty much this — @quinn86, the framing around most people is the part people miss.

Leading with something slightly odd changed the kind of people who replied.

On genuinely free apps, putting one specific interest in the bio was the only change that showed up in the numbers.

My working theory is that how long you leave a conversation running makes more difference than the size of the company behind it for most people.