Mail-order brides aren’t what you think they are.
Maybe in the past, that concept of paying for a wife was true, but these days, mail-order brides mean something totally different.
Now, what the Internet refers to as “mail-order brides” are dating services that connect you to women from countries like Russia to potentially be your wife. You have to put in the effort to get to know and charm them, however, and should you fall in love (or create an arrangement), probably have to pay all legal fees to bring them overseas and make your wife.
One of these dating services is RussianBrides; an international dating service with American-Russian ownership bringing you the best “mail-order brides” from the Ukraine and Russia.
Chances are if you’ve come across this article you’re familiar with the site and the concept of it, but if you really want to know what you’re getting into before signing up for RussianBrides, all you need to do is read on.
First Impression
You can download RussianBrides to your iPhone or Android device, which is good because it opens up the opportunity for everyone to try out their free app. They have a sleek design and looks like a well-designed app.
But to be honest with you, I couldn’t even log in to my account.
The app definitely has its problems, so your best bet is to use their website, but it works just fine, if not better.
When you first log onto RussianBrides you’ll either need to log in or sign up for an account. If you want to, you can browse the homepage and read up on some more information about RussianBrides and visit their F.A.Q. to have your basic questions addressed.
You can create an account by signing in through your Google account or other e-mail address. After completing the quick sign-up process (less than 30 seconds!), you’ll be logged into your account and can begin browsing the significant number of beautiful foreign women on RussianBrides.
Right away, you’ll notice the clean design of their website that makes it easy to navigate. The first thing you see once logged in is a grid of women’s profiles that are currently online, and there are so many you won’t know where to begin.
The girls on RussianBrides are also extremely beautiful. Their profile photos are all high-quality and show off their best features. If you’ve never fallen in love with someone over a photograph, you just might experience that for the first time!
Although you might think there’s no such thing as “too many messages” from hot, foreign girls, there definitely was.
After being online for only a few minutes, the chat requests started pouring in. I got over 50 after being on the site for 15 minutes!
It was a bit overwhelming and made me start to wonder if these women were real. But one look at their profiles and you’ll see that they are, they’re just eager to talk to you since you’re a man from the U.S.
The girls have profiles that feature pictures and videos of themselves, an “About Me” section, and what they’re looking for in a man, as well as their interests.
Features
There aren’t many features on RussianBrides — everything is pretty simple and straightforward, and they provide you with the basic tools necessary for conversation.
I like this because it makes the site not too complicated to use and keeps the goal of finding a partner at the center of use.
You can, however, use a search tool to find profiles that match what you’re looking for. This is one of the fundamental features of practically every dating app out there, so it makes sense that RussianBrides would have it too.
You can state who you are (man or woman) and who you’re looking for (a man or woman), as well as their age and what country or city they’re from. You can also select if you want them to be online currently or available for video chat.
Adding more options is also possible, and you can select what interests you want the girl you’re looking for to have so they can match yours, as well as other factors. These can include their level of education, what languages they speak, if they have kids, etc.
Another feature that RussianBrides has that isn’t an Inbox or Search tool is something called “Let’s Mingle;” an automated message tool that will send whatever message you write to multiple women who they think best fit you at once.
This would require you to fill out your profile completely in order to get the best results.
The layout of a profile on RussianBrides reminds me a bit of a Twitter profile; you can add a cover photo, and the design is similar. You can also add a few words about yourself to your profile, a profile photo, add pictures and videos, select your interests, fill out your own “About Me” section and what you’re looking for in a woman.
Should you ever find a woman that you think is worthy of spoiling, you can send her presents through the site which will be delivered to their doorstep.
Pricing & Membership Benefits
RussianBrides utilizes both credits and a membership upgrade, which is essentially a credit-purchase plan, to unlock certain features. You can purchase credits once at a time to do things on the site, or “upgrade” your membership to get 20 credits.
Along with the 20 credits, you’ll also get 10 free chats, 10 free e-mails, and free introduction messages, which could really help out if you’re not the best conversation starter.
It’s not really clear whether this is a one-time purchase for an upgrade of $2.99, but there is an option for you t select whether you want your account to renew to the same amount when your 20 credits end.
Apparently, there’s also an option to get a one-month subscription for free and be charged $9.99 beginning the second month and continue to be charged that amount until canceled, but I didn’t see how to get that.
I tried sending a girl a gift but was also prompted with another credit payment plan option, which would allow me to get 500 credits for $249.00, or 600 credits for$299.00.
What you get from purchasing these credits, though, is the ability to communicate freely. When you don’t have any credits, you can only reply to a girl once and won’t be able to see any more of her messages, and will also be barred from sending any more messages to her.
You’ll finally be able to use live chat freely as well as use e-mail communication and offline messaging. You can send gifts, as mentioned, use the “Let’s Mingle” feature, and send stickers in chat.
If you want to video chat with a girl that can also be possible with the purchase of credits.
Pros
Women respond really fast on RussianBrides, and you’ll never be lonely on here. There’s always a real woman waiting to talk to you, and they aren’t afraid to take the initiative themselves by sending you the first message.
Cons
I now believe that getting too many messages is a thing. It’s distracting and confuses who you’ve responded to already because your chat can get lost in the abundance of messages. You can’t even enjoy a nice conversation without purchasing credits.
Which brings me to my next point;
Buying credits on RussianBrides is kind of confusing, and you only get so many opportunities to use the features before running out of credits, which can be costly.
Conclusion & Rating
RussianBrides is an excellent site to use for meeting foreign women and, hopefully, making a connection with them to find your spouse.
If you have the money for it.
Their credit system seems to be expensive, and the credits don’t last for very long. But you have options like Ru Brides and Rosebrides.
But other than that, RussianBrides makes it extremely easy to meet and talk to gorgeous women from Russia and Ukraine.
RussianBrides gets 3.5/5 Stars.