Dating.com Review: Find love online or scam site?

With so many dating sites out there, it’s hard to know which ones work and which ones don’t. Luckily, we’ve reviewed all of them to help you find which one suits you best.

Next up on our list is Dating.com. Whoever bagged this domain name really lucked out, since it’s probably the most straightforward dating site name out there.

Amazingly, Dating.com has been on the scene since 1993. That’s right, almost thirty years. The site itself is older than most of the people who use it. Quite an achievement, we’re sure you’ll agree.

But how does Dating.com compare to other dating sites? Has it held up over the years or has it fallen by the wayside? Check out our Dating.com review below.

Dating.com: First Impressions

Dating.com looks great. It’s got a simple, bright, red and white color scheme that’s easy on the eye, and the numerous hearts dotted around the home screen let you know exactly what the site is about.

First and foremost, Dating.com is a site for people to find love and long-term relationships. Despite hookup sites being the modern craze, Dating.com keeps things traditional in its approach.

From the home screen you’re treated to a sample of the user base. You’ll see a handful of profile photos which have clearly been pre-selected since they’re all gorgeous men and women. This seemed a little iffy to me, but judging by the details in their profiles, they were all real people. They were dotted all around the world, but I don’t expect the site

Which brings me to my first point. Usually, clicking around on profile photos usually takes you to the sign in page, but Dating.com does things a little differently. Even without signing up, you can view users profiles in full, including their profile photos, their interests and their bio.

All over the front page, Dating.com encouraged me to “take a chance.” As I scrolled down, I was treated to this whimsical piece of wisdom:

“Dating is a chance — a chance to meet someone new, a chance for them to introduce you to people, places and things that you never knew that you’d love. It’s the chance to meet anyone, anywhere in the world. It’s the chance that there might be more out there, something you’ve never even imagined.”

Okay, so it’s a little bit Julia Roberts for my tastes, but at least they were trying. Overall, first impressions of this dating site were good. I really loved the look and feel of it, and despite the hand-picked profile photos on the front page, my hopes were high.

Features

To do anything other than scroll through the profiles on the front page, you’ll have to sign up. Luckily, the Dating.com registration process is as simple as it comes.

You’ll just need to provide your basic information like age, email address, password and location and your account will be created. You’re also free to sign in with your Google or Facebook account to save time. This will import all of your basic info for you.

From that point, you have the option to fill out your “About You” section. This information consists of sexual preferences, interests and a small bio about yourself. You’ll also be prompted to upload up to 12 photos.

Once you’ve set up your dating profile, you’re free to start getting matches and sending messages. You’ll also be able to scroll through profiles at your leisure and search profiles by keyword. By default, your feed will consist of users nearest to you but you can use the preferences button to change your top matches.

After doing some digging, I found that there is a staggering 70 million users on Dating.com. Yes, you read that correctly. 70 million people around the world currently have an active account on Dating.com. If this site was a country, it would be the 20th most populated country in the world. That’s more than both Tinder and POF.

Its massive user base becomes apparent pretty quickly. The main page is a constant revolving new of profiles coming and going, and while I was on here, I din’t see the same member twice. Better yet, I could tell from the photos and short bios that they were all legitimate users too. Very few fake profiles in sight.

To message users, Dating. com uses a credits system. We’ll get to the finer details of credits in the next section, but quite simply, every time you want to message a member, you need to spend credits. Different actions require different amounts of credits, but that’s the basic gist of the service.

I found the reply rate from singles to be decent, especially as I was a brand new member to the site. For every ten messages, around two people responded. For men, that’s a pretty good ratio. I can only assume women’s success will be much higher.

The messaging is broke down into two services. The first is email, which is like any other messaging system on any online dating app. But in addition to email, there’s also “live chat,” which is pretty much the same as email but takes place in a little chat box on the side of the screen. Email and live chat are more or less the same, but they cost different amounts of credits to use. More on that in the next section.

As far as other interactive features go, there’s not much more information to share. There are no chat rooms, no forums, no mini-games. If you want to chat, you have to do it directly. This is quite surprising for a site of this caliber to say the least.

Pricing & Membership

Dating.com doesn’t utilize the standard tiered membership approach. There’s no such thing as a standard membership or premium membership on here. Instead, the site uses a credits system.

You go to the credit purchasing page, input your payment information and choose your preferred credits bundle. Cost wise, it breaks down like this:

• 150 Credits – $49.99 ($0.33 per credit)
• 600 Credits – $149.99 ($0.25 per credit)
• 1,500 Credits – $299.99 ($0.20 per credit)

What can credits get you? Well, to put things in perspective, sending an email to another member costs 10 credits. Meanwhile, every minute of live chat costs 1 credit.

You’ll also have to use credits if you want to watch any videos in members profiles, and video chat with other members cost 10 credits per minute.

So, if you send 15 messages to another user and get nowhere, then you’re forced to go back and get more credits. Quite obviously, this can put quite a dent in your bank balance if you’re not careful.

Pros

Dating.com has a lot going for it. There are plenty of pros to the site. These are the major ones.

The registration process only takes a few minutes. Some modern dating sites put members through a whole endurance test when signing up with quizzes and questionnaires. That’s not the case at all with Dating.com. Having the option to setup your profile via your Facebook or Google account is a nice touch too.

The extensive user base alone makes Dating.com worth giving a shot. As of January 2021, 70 million members across 32 countries utilize the service, which is as many as Tinder or Match. Statistically that puts you at a great advantage of finding singles close to you.

In the modern age of hookup and fuck sites, Dating.com goes the old school route. With numerous hearts and canoodling couples dotted around the website, it’s clear that Dating.com is a place to find love rather than lust. This is probably a relief for many people (especially the women) who are sick of guys just trying to get in their pants.

For a site of this magnitude you’d expect one or two scammers to find their way onto the platform. You’ll be happy to know that scammers and fake profiles in general are kept to a minimum, as Dating com are seemingly quite skilled at weeding them out and removing them. A few slip through, but that’s unavoidable. Likewise, customer service is on point too.

Chatting to another user is as easy as it comes, however, the whole chatting experience is soured by the credits system. More on that in the cons section.

I loved the fact that there were almost no ads dotted around the site. This suggests that Dating.com is financially stable enough to forego advertisements; something else which puts a big tick in the positives box.

On a similar note, there was also zero adult content plastered on the site (unless you count the hot girls’ profile photos, which I don’t). Most modern dating apps boast their fair share of free porn videos these days, and any app that does is a major red flag to me. This means that Dating. com doesn’t feel the need to lure in members with the promises of naked women.

Cons

Despite its popularity and its massive user base, Dating. com has a good number of downsides too.

First and foremost, the credits system. I’ve never known a dating app use a credits system like this. It’s usually reserved for cam and adult pages. And needless to say, it’s terrible. The fact that multiple people thought a credit service would be a good idea is terrifying.

I get that the site needs to make money, but I’m struggling to understand why any person would choose this system over a basic membership service. It’s an obvious drain on the bank account and dissuades a ton of people from joining up.

The credits system feels a little like gambling to me. You buy your tokens, slot them in and hope for the best. Maybe you’ve already sunk 10 messages into one particular member, so you’re driven to get that date whatever it costs. That means you’ll buy more credits, when in fact you might not get anywhere. It’s got carny written all over it to me.

Then there’s the chat system. What crazy person out there thought that “email” and “live chat” should be differentiated? It’s obviously just another way to wring its members of their cash. The email / chat system succeeds in doing one thing – driving members to communicate outside of the Dating.com platform. Same with the video chat system.

The matches system isn’t very good on Dating.com. For whatever reason, it throws singles at you from all over the world, and you have to do some jigging around to narrow it down to people you have a reasonable chance of meeting in prson.

One thing I really disliked was that it doesn’t show you when members were last online until after you message them. I thought this was a bit scammy, as it’s obviously designed to make you use up your credits faster so you have to buy more.

Worst yet is that some of these members haven’t been online in years, and yet they’re still being presented as potential matches to active members. Dating.com needs to sort out their matches algorithm pronto. This is a total carny move and really detracts from the otherwise enjoyable experience.

The search function is terrible. Even at its most basic, you can search for a simple location or keyword and find a million members who don’t fit your criteria at all. You can search for New York and find members from other countries entirely. It’s very buggy and not streamlined at all.

And on the subject of the search button, you can’t filter your search results down to find the perfect singles for you. Most websites offer filters by age range, body type, income, education, etc. No filters at all on here. You just have to scroll through members and hope you run into the girl of your dreams.

Conclusion

Overall, Dating.com is certainly worth a few weeks of your time. It’s free to look around and you’ll only have to pay when you find a person who takes your fancy.

If you sink enough time in, you’ll find dates without a doubt. Will you find a relationship? Impossible to say, but Dating.com provides a good platform to find that perfect person. Your bank account might take a hit, but if you keep a budget in mind, you’ll get the best out of Dating.com.

Overall, I’m giving Dating.com a rating of 3.5 out of 5.

An overhaul of the credits and matches system would bump this up significantly, but until then, the site will only work if you put the effort in and don’t mind spending more money than you would with an average membership package.

We hope you’ve enjoyed our Dating.com review and we hope the site helps you find love if you decide to check it out. We’ve got plenty of other reviews available so check them out if this site doesn’t do it for you.

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