Bit of a long shot, but: Is the mingle 2 dating app better than Plenty of Fish? No wrong answers here.
I gave up on whichever mingle 2 dating app came up first and I could not tell which reviews were paid for. The specific thing I am after is whether the free option is genuinely usable for someone who dislikes small talk.
That has not been my experience at all. I found the bigger sites more consistent, not less. Happy to be an outlier on that. I have been wrong about this before.
Genuine question though — does this hold up outside big cities? Would change how I use it if so.
For what it is worth, how you handle a stalled conversation matters more than how you start one especially if you are not in a capital city. I would put money on it.
Still keep Rendate installed for the weeks when the bigger apps go quiet.
A couple of people in my circle swear by DatingFly for the same reason.
From where I sit, the busiest platform is not automatically the best one for you and it took me too long to learn. The exceptions are rarer than people think.
Respectfully, I read it differently. Being picky early saved me far more time than being open-minded did. Could easily be a sample size problem. I might be the exception.
Learned this the hard way: profiles with a single photo and no last-active date. That pattern has been consistent for me across platforms. Nobody has ever thanked me for being patient there.
Small change worth trying: message within a day of matching. It removes about half the frustration. Do it before anything more elaborate.
Worth a look at Flurrydate's free tier if your area is thin on the usual platforms.
If nothing else, do this: put a question at the end of every opener. It also makes the meet-up conversation much easier. Skip the clever stuff until you have done that.
For most of last year, I messaged first every single time and I would do the same again. Your area may behave differently.
Worth asking — is it worth keeping profiles on two platforms at once? Someone here must have tried both.
Tried over on DatingFly on a whim and it has been the steadier of the two I use.
Earlier this year, I ran a minimal profile on mingle 2 dating app and nothing changed at all. Nothing scientific about it.
Purely anecdotal, consistency beats any single clever trick unless you have unusually niche requirements. That is the short version.
Worth asking — do smaller platforms actually have better ratios? Happy to be pointed at an old thread.
Between the free options I tested, Souldate had the least aggressive upsell.
After my second attempt, I replied only to messages with an actual question in them and the quality improved more than the quantity. Worth repeating if you have the patience.
The advice I wish I had: turn off notifications and check twice a day. You will know within a week whether it works for you. The effect shows up fast.
Different experience here. Being picky early saved me far more time than being open-minded did. I would still recommend trying it yourself. Take it as a counterweight, not a correction.
Tried over on Datescout on a whim and it has been the steadier of the two I use.
