eharmony??

[Real36]

I'm sure this tread exists here somewhere but I'm gonna ask anyway. Anyone have any thoughts on how well eharmony works out? I've been single for a year and I feel ready to get back out there but I don't want to try any more free dating sights. I know 2 people who have had success on eharmony, one just married a girl he met using the sight. Any advice would be appreciated. Thanks!

[mammasita]

Honestly, the same people are on all the sites as far as I've seen. I was on all of them when I was single....POF, OKC, Match and even eharmony. I met my BF (together for 10 months now) on POF.

[JungleLover]

My experience on eHarmony has been overall been pretty good. I met my current GF on eHarmony and I am really going head over hills for her. My last 3 relationships have been from eHarmony. The first one ended for a very silly reason. The one before my current relationship was not the best match for me but I believe it was because my ex just lied about something on her profile about something that I would have never accepted in a relationship. I can't blame eHarmony for that. She was still a good person overall but we were just not compatible.

 

I did meet a crazy woman on that that I had to wind up blocking her number from my phone but this did not taint my overall experience since the other dates I had were decent. I feel that the people I was matched with and finally start communicated, were not out of the left field.

 

My advice would be to really try to get to know the person with deep questions during the initial communication to weed out the dates that just won't fit. Don't be afraid to probe rather quickly. Any person that is serious about truly finding someone will take time to give you nice, deep replies. I knew my current girlfriend was the one for me when she answered one of my deep questions with so much sincerity. After I read it I was like "this is her!"

[JungleLover]

What Eharmony fails to mention is that they are "unable to help" 1 out of 5 users. You spend 15 mins filling out their questionaire and it doesn't even give you the opportunity to see anyone in your area. This happened to me, and a friend of mine. If you live in a small town, Eharmony probably won't help you because they have a very limited selection of people. You don't get to pick who you talk to, they do.

 

 

True. I like this feature, personally. Due to my profession, I don't want someone just searching profiles and seeing my profile even if I would never date them in a million years. What I like about eHarmony is that the person they choose for you through the matches is likely to be someone you will have a decent date with so much less time is wasted. It is definitely not always the case.

[bu2002]

If you're Caucasian or Hispanic, I would give it a try. Your profile matches will net a higher volume.

 

I'm an Asian male, and the matches just aren't there. We're already going to have a more limited pool to deal with to begin with, and that just gets smaller with the matching algorithm.

[Michelle ma Belle]

I've done eHarmony twice; once right after my divorce when I finally felt I was ready to date again and then again about 2 years ago. I wasn't on for more than 2 or 3 months each time.

 

My review of eHarmony is that it's just like any other dating site just more expensive.

 

I chatted with a number of men and met a few in person but all of them made me question what the hell was I doing when I filled out that ridiculously long assessment that matched me with these man! They ALL did NOT feel remotely like a match.

 

And just like anything online, you have your bad apples that spoil the bunch. I encountered married men, a few fakes/scammers and countless horny toads looking for a sweltering cyber f*ck and/or real life hook-up and nothing more.

 

Just another day on the internet

 

At the end of the day OLD is just a game of odds. Some win and some lose. The only way to make it through alive is to remember to take it with a grain of salt and always have a sense of humor about it.

 

Good luck.

[Elle1975]

Did not like the experience at all. You get stuck with the profiles that they send you, when you could get the same selectivity from Match with the ability to go astray if you wanted to.

[Sith Apprentice]

Eharmony was a waste of money. 4 months on Eharmony resulted in getting 1 phone number from a woman who flaked out before our first date. I probably sent out over 200 messages while I was there. I cancelled my account in disgust and swore off online dating for 2 years after that.

 

You can't browse profiles which is complete BS. You can only message people that the site matches you with. They trickle 2-3 matches to you per day which is just a scheme to keep you subscribing as long as possible. Eventually you'll expend all your matches and the site will begin recycling old matches to you. You might get a date here and there and then months of nothing.

 

The matching feature is mostly BS and a romantic version of "bro science."

Edited July 24, 2014 by Sith Apprentice

[Gaeta]

I did not like eharmony. I took a 1 month subscription at $65. Every morning I'd get a bunch of profiles suggested as matches for me. Most were old profiles of men that had not been online for weeks or months. In one entire month on there only 1 man got back to me and we never went past exchange pre-fabricated questions.

 

On regular dating sites it's more work to filter through men contacting me but at least I go on dates each week and I'm out there active in the dating world.

[Keenly]

The website sucks. You can't browse through people, and 95% of my matches have been inactive for over a month.

[Sunfire73]

I know 2 couples who met there and are now married. So just like with other online dating sites, it can work. But for me it didn't. Never met anyone there, the process is too tedious, and didn't like my matches. Match.com worked for me as I found my now bf there. It's been a year since he first messaged me, so there are good guys. And true, the same people are there as with other sites, my bf claimed he messaged me before at okc. I'm just glad we found each other again when it didn't work the first time...we are ready for something more serious.

[bubbaganoosh]

That old guy who does the advertisement always reminded me of Mister Rodgers dad.

[d0nnivain]

I was on it years ago . . . maybe 10 years ago.

 

I liked it to an extent. For me, I took comfort in the fact that at the time it was the most expensive & that questionnaire thing is a p.i.t.a. to fill out. I figured that would weed out people who only wanted something causal because it was too much effort. The men I was matched with were quality guys on paper & ostensibly what I wanted. I only went on 3 dates from my 90 day membership & didn't click with any of them -- no chemistry -- but the experience was OK.

 

The downsides were that often I'd get these matches but even when I reached out I didn't get a response. I came to learn that the system does connect people by profile without regard to whether they are still active subscribers. I didn't figure this out until after my subscription ended & I'd get daily e-mails telling me I had new matches if I would just renew. With all of these "free communication" weekends, I suspect that the system bumps up its membership numbers so this happens more frequently now. I would feel hurt & disappointed when I didn't get a response so I didn't like that.

 

Another downside was that the system kept pressuring me to widen my geographic area. When I opened it up enough -- 50 miles -- to include NYC I did get a lot more matches but it was always such a p.i.t.a. to connect with these guys IRL. One I actually thought could work point blank told me he wasn't willing to enter into an LDR with me. I didn't think 1 hour was that far but it was too far for him. So I agree with whoever said it's better if you don't live in a small town.

[TXGuy]

eHarmony is the only online site I have used. I cannot compare it to others, but I like it a lot and wouldn't consider another one. But I'm in a large city and over 40, so I've never had the problem of insufficient or inactive matches.

 

Things I liked:

- it is a paid site, so that generally filters out non serious hookup types.

- the endless compatability questionnaire also filters out the non serious.

- I actually think the comparability software works reasonably well. On the whole, the matches I was presented were more compatible with me than a random sample from match would have been.

- only a small number of matches can see you. You are not on display to the world.

- the three step canned communication worked well for me as far as breaking the ice and filtering matches out.

- you are only given x (~8) matches per day. That allows/forces you to consider your matches at an easily digestible pace. I understand the other sites will be feast (first week) or famine (after the second week), at least for guys. During the feast time, with other sites, you might not be able to devote enough attention to interesting prospects. That can hurt their feelings/piss them off to the point they might not be open to dating later.

 

I've found the women on the site to be high quality and reasonably compatible. I generally can only leave my matches open for two or three days before I've identified one or more women that make me want to turn off the matching pipeline.

[smackie9]

It depends of your search style:

I feel eharmony would be better for a user that doesn't have time to search through a bunch of profiles.....more convienent for busy people.

 

No matter what you do, finding someone is no dif than going out and meeting people socially, it's a hit or miss. I think people's expectations of these sites are too high because they blame their lack of sucess on the site itself.

[StoneCold 2.0]

 

Re the costs? Really? If a man(other than a student) couldn't invest a hundred dollars to find me then that doesn't say much about his financial situation. I just spent 3 times that on new tires for my car.

 

Maybe he has a problem with the principle of it....pay money for a service that guarantees nothing and is no more effective than the free alternatives?!?...No way!...why?

 

A) Many on eharmony are on all the other free sites too; and

 

B) When dealing with the intricacies of a good match/relationship...Just because you pay and did some silly survey...doesn't make you or it any better. Its a bad sales pitch and a foolish notion to subscribe to...sorry, but the "right match" should never be for sale (it hasnt been from since the beginning of our existence); its tacky and misleading

 

...or how about the good ole fashioned way? far more effective and exciting than online too....

 

People really will buy anything

 

I wouldnt pay 100 pennies for a dating service....purely out of principle

Edited July 24, 2014 by StoneCold 2.0

[soccerrprp]

My best dates have come from EH. I met my fiancee from EH. We both agree that "more" serious people are willing and can afford to pay for EH. Less control as to who you are connected to, but my experience has been (was) positive.

[smackie9]

The way I see it if you have touble finding anyone interested in you IRL then you will have trouble finding someone interested in you on OLD sites.

 

All these site are really for is giving people more access to others, and that's it. All the rest is YOUR responsibility.

[Real36]

Thanks for input everyone. Seems like opinions are split pretty well down the middle with a few non-OLD users in the mix. Still haven't made up my mind. I'll spend some more time thinking on it.

[William]

Since LoveShack is an interpersonal relationship forum and not a dating service rating forum, when discussion threads about online dating start to sound like an ad for a subscription service, pursuant to our policy of no advertising, we conclude things and encourage members to discuss their relationships, the primary mission of LoveShack.