With all the types of dating sites out there it can be hard to figure out which one to use. Being college students, we experience a consistent lack of money. Here are some free dating sites and apps that you can use to potentially (or not) find the love of your life.
OkCupid
I got OkCupid for myself before I decided to write this article. I found the format to be much easier to use and more what I thought online dating would be. It asks some personal questions and the profile asks specific things like things we can’t live without. By having that detail is shows how much people care about their profile, or how much they don’t.
One problem is that anyone can look at your profile. Like creepy older men who then send you messages you don’t want. I know it can seem sketchy but overall it’s a pretty good website and for the most part people on there are fairly nice.
Tinder
I got Tinder after I decided to write this so how I interacted on it was based on me gaining enough material to write this. It very much seems like a game to me, not something to take seriously. When you get a match it literally asks if you want to keep playing. Tinder seems like just another game app that 20 something’s have. I played this two different ways- one where I read the profile and one where I didn’t and just judged based on pictures. When I read the profiles I was a lot less likely to swipe right but when I did it based on their pictures
I did have some nice conversations on Tinder and I like how we had to mutually like each other to start talking. One critique I have is that there isn’t a lot of direction with how to do the profile and for someone as clueless as me that’s a little difficult. I used my OkCupid profile as a base for the Tinder one though, so I had that advantage.
Her
This app is specifically for queer women. I had high hopes and got little results. First problem is that the set up is terrible. I couldn’t figure it out and the layout is just ugly. There wasn’t really an “about me” section so I just typed something where there was suppose to be a picture. I found the layout way too off putting and just gave up.
Bumble
It’s basically Tinder but women have to message their match first and it goes away after 24 hours. I think it’s a good way to push yourself out of your comfort-zone if you identify as a woman. Personally I really never messaged anyone first until Bumble and by looking at it made me really think about why I was doing online dating. I was doing it for this article, obviously but it wasn’t until I had to send messages to people did I realize how much I don’t want to date.
Overall:
I feel I learned a lot about myself and what I want, or don’t want, in a significant other. The conversations I had were nice for the most part. It was enjoyable and there were some pretty cool people on all the apps.