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Affiliate disclosure · Adults 18+
How this site makes money
Some links here earn us a commission. It costs you nothing extra, it does not change our rankings, and two of the five platforms we cover carry warnings rather than recommendations. Here is the whole arrangement.
The short version. If you click a link on this site and sign up to a dating platform, we may be paid a commission by that platform. You pay the same price you would have paid going direct. We are not paid to rank anything in any particular order, and we publish negative reviews of platforms that would pay us.
What an affiliate link is
Some of the links on this site are affiliate links. When you follow one and go on to register or subscribe with that dating platform, the platform pays us a percentage or a flat fee for sending you.
You pay exactly what you would have paid going direct. There is no markup, no surcharge and no worse deal for using our link. The commission comes out of the platform’s marketing budget, not your pocket.
Not every link is an affiliate link. Links between our own pages are not, and links to sources, research or news coverage are not.
Where the links are, and how they are marked
The matching tool at the top of every page leads to an affiliate destination. Links to reviewed platforms within our reviews may also be affiliate links.
Every page on this site carries a disclosure in the footer, and the matching tool states it directly above the button. Affiliate links carry rel="sponsored" in the markup, which is what Google asks for and what tells automated tools the relationship exists.
What commission does not buy
This is the part that matters, so it is specific rather than a general reassurance.
- Position in our rankings. The order on our homepage reflects how well each platform serves an older man looking for a younger woman. It is not sorted by what pays.
- A score. Nobody has ever been given a number they asked for.
- Inclusion. Platforms that pay us nothing appear in our rankings. Platforms that would pay us have been left out for failing our age verification requirement.
- A kind review. Two of the five platforms we cover carry warnings rather than recommendations. One has repositioned itself away from our readers and one has been described by independent reviewers as having almost no genuine members. Publishing that costs us money.
- Silence about problems. Where a platform has confusing pricing, an aggressive renewal or a difficult cancellation, we say so in the review, including for platforms we recommend.
What we refuse outright
Separate from affiliate commission, and worth stating because we are asked regularly:
- We do not sell positions in rankings.
- We do not sell scores or badges.
- We do not accept payment to insert a link into an existing page.
- We do not publish sponsored posts or guest posts written by anyone else.
- We do not accept payment to remove or soften a negative review.
The line is simple. Being paid for a referral is a normal commercial arrangement that we disclose. Being paid for an opinion is not, and it would make everything else on this site worthless.
Why we tell you all this
Partly because the US Federal Trade Commission requires it. Anyone with a financial relationship to a product they recommend has to disclose it clearly, in language a reader actually understands, close to the recommendation itself. That is why the disclosure is in the footer of every page and above the matching tool, rather than buried on a page nobody visits.
Mostly though, we do it because of why this site exists. Judy started it after watching her father pay for two dating sites nobody had honestly assessed for him. The lists he found recommended everything, and the most enthusiastic recommendations turned out to be the best paying ones. A site built in response to that has no business hiding how it is funded.
Questions or complaints
If you think something on this site reads like it was written for a commission rather than for you, email judy@datingappcritic.com and say which page. That is a fair challenge and it gets a straight answer.
More on how we review and what we will not list is on our about page.
Not legal advice
This page explains our commercial arrangements in plain language. It is a disclosure, not a legal document, and nothing here is legal advice. Our terms of use and privacy policy cover the formal side.
Judy, and the Dating App Critic team
Founder and editor
I started this site after watching my father go quiet. He was in his sixties, still walking five miles most mornings, still the first one up, still curious about everything. The women he was introduced to were at a different stage of life, settled in ways he was not, and the conversations rarely went anywhere. He was not looking for a bridge partner. He wanted someone with the same appetite for the day that he had.
He tried three dating sites and gave up on all three, having paid for two of them. That is the part I could not let go. Not that it was hard, but that nobody had told him which ones were worth his money before he spent it.
So we write the reviews I wish he had been able to read. We say when a platform is thin, when the pricing is misleading, and when a site is simply the wrong tool for a wide age gap, even when saying so costs us a commission.
Questions people ask us
Does using your links cost me more?
No. You pay exactly the price you would have paid going to the platform directly. There is no markup and no worse deal for arriving through us.
The commission comes out of the platform’s marketing budget rather than your subscription.
Are your rankings sorted by who pays you most?
No. The order reflects how well each platform serves an older man looking for a younger woman.
Platforms that pay us nothing appear in the rankings, and two of the five we cover carry warnings rather than recommendations, which costs us commission we would otherwise earn.
Can a dating site pay to be reviewed favourably?
No. We do not sell rankings, scores, badges, link insertions or sponsored posts, and we do not accept payment to remove or soften a negative review.
Being paid for a referral is a normal arrangement that we disclose. Being paid for an opinion is a different thing, and it would make the rest of the site worthless.
How do I know which links are affiliate links?
The matching tool at the top of every page leads to an affiliate destination, and it says so directly above the button. Links to reviewed platforms inside our reviews may also be affiliate links.
Affiliate links carry rel=”sponsored” in the markup, and every page carries a disclosure in the footer.
What if I think a review was written for the commission?
Email judy@datingappcritic.com and say which page and what reads wrong. It is a fair challenge and it gets a straight answer rather than a form response.
If the criticism holds, the page gets changed and the change is noted on it.