Method
How we rate platforms
Every score on this site comes out of the same six criteria, weighted the same way, applied to every platform. This page sets out what those are, where our information comes from, and what our ratings are explicitly not.
The six criteria
Value for money
25%Not just the headline price. What the shortest available term is, whether features are bundled or sold as add-ons, how the renewal is priced against the sign-up price, and what happens to your money if you cancel early.
Matching model
20%How the platform decides who you see, how much control you retain, and whether the model matches the intent it advertises. A behavioural model and a questionnaire model suit different people; we score how well each is executed, not which philosophy we prefer.
Pool quality
20%Active user base rather than registered accounts, the reported prevalence of fake, recycled or dormant profiles, and how the pool holds up outside major metropolitan areas.
Company stability
15%Ownership, financial position and operating history. Added as a weighted criterion in 2026 after EliteSingles closed with two days of notice. A prepaid annual subscription is a bet on the company still trading in a year.
Transparency and billing conduct
10%Whether pricing is stated clearly before checkout, how auto-renewal is handled, how hard cancellation is, and the pattern of regulatory or consumer-protection actions against the company.
Product experience
10%Signup friction, interface quality on mobile and desktop, whether filters and preferences are actually respected, and the state of customer support.
Where our information comes from
- Each platform's own published pricing, plan terms and feature documentation.
- Company announcements, ownership records and insolvency or restructuring filings.
- Established industry reporting on the dating sector, from outlets such as Global Dating Insights, DatingNews and Online Personals Watch.
- Regulatory and consumer-protection actions, including FTC proceedings.
- Aggregate patterns in public user reviews across Trustpilot, the BBB and ConsumerAffairs, read for recurring themes rather than individual accounts.
What our ratings are not
Stated plainly
We do not claim to have personally dated our way through every platform, and you should be sceptical of sites that do. Our ratings are structured desk research: pricing, mechanics, ownership, regulatory history and the aggregate weight of public user reporting. Where we describe what using a platform is like, we are summarising documented user experience, not narrating our own.
We also do not publish invented testimonials, fabricated success statistics, or exact dollar figures we cannot stand behind. Dating platforms vary pricing by region, by session and by promotion, so we describe the shape of the pricing and tell you to check the number at checkout.
How we make money, and what it does not buy
Pairlynx earns affiliate commissions. If you subscribe to a platform through a link on this site, we may receive a commission at no additional cost to you. Every such link is marked as an affiliate link and carries the appropriate technical attribution.
What that does not buy: position. No platform can pay for a higher rank, a better score, a removed criticism or a favourable comparison. The clearest evidence of this on the site is that our top-rated platform is also the one we spend the most words warning you about, and that a platform we do earn commission on carries an explicit recommendation not to buy its cheapest long-term plan.
Where a platform has no affiliate programme at all, as with EliteSingles now that it has closed, we still cover it, because the people searching for it need an answer.
Corrections
Pricing and company circumstances in this category change quickly. If something here is out of date or wrong, tell us at [email protected] and we will fix it and note the change. Every page carries the date it was last checked.
Method last reviewed August 10, 2026.