Now a decade old – WhatsApp burst onto the scene and made quite a ripple with their direct messaging service. Often used to share images instantly with friends, colleagues and family – WhatsApp is a free alternative to text messaging or Facebook Messenger. Loved by many for the ability to share images, texts and even make calls instantly. Tinder is a free dating app with a lot of perks to offer young singles. Over 50% of Tinder members are between 18 and 25 years old. You can create a Tinder profile instantly by connecting to your social media accounts, and the app encourages members to stay active, send GIFs, and engage in multiple flirty conversations to up their odds of meeting the right person online.

Finding your soulmate is priceless. Sure. But do you have to use a paid site to find a real relationship? Does a monthly fee really weed out people who aren't taking the process seriously?

This wasn't really an issue before 2012, but the Tinder-led surge of 30-second profiles and instant access to all single folks within 10 miles gave sites with tedious personality analyses and upscale subscriptions a run for their money — literally.

Vox said what we're all really thinking: 'At what point in the completely nightmarish process of online dating does one decide that it’s worth spending money on making that experience slightly less terrible?'

Is it worth paying for a dating site?

According to Reddit and Consumer Reports, not really. This Consumer Reports survey found that free sites actually scored better than paid sites on this when it came to overall satisfaction because they're a 'better value.' Unless you're absolutely lost without those heavy-duty matchmaking algorithms, many free sites still offer the questionnaires, detailed bios, and compatibility ratings that indicate red flags and users you wouldn't get along with.

There's no one dating site that everyone is particularly psyched about. Swiping exhaustion and creepily persistent users are an omnipresent part of all online dating. Sorry, but a paid subscription isn't a metal detector that pulls all of the upstanding, faithful singles up out of the crowd. When there are sites that can offer millions of users for free and success stories to prove they work, why not try them before spending $40 per month elsewhere?

A hefty price point doesn't guarantee the absence of fakes or catfishes, either. (In 2019, some guy on match posed as a millionaire and stole $80,000 from the woman he was talking to.) Many free sites are just as big on privacy and safety, requiring users to verify themselves through Facebook to increase transparency about age and first names. No paid sites have the safety features that Tinder does, which is the first of the Match Group apps to offer 911 assistance and location services to make meeting a stranger safer.

The aesthetic experience certainly isn't what your money is going toward, either. Many of the older, subscription-based sites have been slow to modernize their UX designs, still relying on the very 2000s style of bombarding you with notifications for every wink, message, and whatever else.

Can you actually fall in love with someone online?

We've all accepted that online dating is great for finding a friend with benefits, but telling family members that it's getting serious with that person you met online still takes convincing. However, recent studies show that meeting online can foster a pretty reliable romantic foundation.

A 2017 study cited in the MIT Technology Review found that people who meet online are more likely to be compatible and have a better chance at a healthy marriage if they decide to get hitched. Another study found that heterosexual couples who met online were quicker to tie the knot. These stats don't take anything from correlation to causation, but they do make the case that people who sign up for dating sites that require thoughtful responses are in a better spot to settle down.

There's an unspoken assumption that people on free dating sites are young, horny people with no disposable income and that people on paid dating site are mature, employed individuals who are ready to settle down. But eharmony, Match, Tinder, and OkCupid have rather similar age demographics, all with surprisingly close splits between people in their 20s, 30s, and 40s.

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Which dating sites are actually free?

Waters get muddied when basically every damn dating site has some sort of paid and free version. True free apps let users do all of this as a baseline, and then offer paid perks such as the ability to see everyone who has swiped right on you or boosting your profile for a certain amount of time. Free-but-not-really apps are the ones that are technically free to use, but you have to pay to do just about anything including read or respond to messages.

Premium memberships of freemium apps are an affordable way to give more control over your pool of potential boos, but they probably don't do much to expedite the grueling swiping process. When Tinder released Tinder Gold, it beat out Candy Crush as the Apple Store's top-grossing app. People were that willing to pay to see who swiped right on them. That might be handy knowledge if you're looking to get laid, but it's hard to tell if it would help find someone that you like enough to share your life with. No one I know has kept a paid version of a free app for more than a month.

At any rate, there's a certain serendipitous feeling that comes with the possibility that, out of the millions of users Hinge could have shown you that day, your soulmate popped up in the crowd of 10 likes you can give out per day (compared to the unlimited likes that come with Hinge Preferred).

These are the best free dating sites for finding a serious relationship:

Online dating is hard, y'all — but so is dating in person. Basically, dating is just the worst, which is why we're always trying to save you time by ranking the best online dating sites in general, the best dating sites for introverts, the best dating apps for college students, and, hell, even the best sexting apps for those who just want to 'date' from home. Dating sucks...until you find someone you truly vibe with, that is. Then dating is *the best.*

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If you're not sure about which dating site you should sign up for (AKA spend money on) or which app to download, testing them out for free first is a great idea. But for some dating apps and sites, the free version may actually be all you need.

At some point you've probably considered registering for a dating site — that is, until you see the subscription prices and decide that maybe it's cheaper to just sip a beer at a bar. Sorry, eharmony, but some of us don't have the funds to spend $40 per month on finding a significant other. We got bills, yo.

Or maybe you want to test the waters of online dating without investing a lot. The expensive sites do offer free trials, but seven days isn't enough time to find someone. What you need is a free dating site that gives you a full array of options and that isn't a total scam. You want to be able to actually message and match with the people you see on the apps.

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We did the research for you and have compiled a comprehensive list of the best free dating apps and sites, and will give you the lowdown on what type of person each one is best suited for. (And if you land a hot date out of this, we expect a thank you.)

Note: It's almost impossible to find a dating site or app that doesn't have some sort of paid upgrade feature, but these are the sites where the free option gives you most everything you need for the full experience (paid options mostly give you more unlimited access, like unlimited swipes or returning to an accidental left-swipe, but to some people, that's helpful). These aren't like Match or eharmony where you need to pay to do basically anything.

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