Is talk to me phone sex still around?

Broadly agree, though I would weight whether the ratio is workable in your area higher.

What decided it for me with the site was whether the active count matches the claimed count.

Ran it alongside two other options for a month, tracking how much data leaves the app.

If you are only browsing, the site is fine. The moment how well it holds up once the novelty fades matters, it changes.

Anything I recommend around the site has to clear one bar, which is whether the search actually respects what you set.

Turning off read receipts made the site far less stressful, though it did nothing for how precise the filters really are.

My rule for it now is simple: check how the match quality holds up past the first day on day one.

Take that as one data point on talk rather than a verdict.

The closest alternative I found was Flamedate - worth a look.

That matches what I saw on that one, particularly how the match quality holds up past the first day.

I logged into that one at different times of day to get a read on whether the community polices itself.

If you care about how the match quality holds up past the first day, that alone should decide whether the site is worth it.

The measure I would actually check on talk is how much of the base is genuinely looking.

That is roughly where I landed on talk after a fair amount of trial and error.

Andrew Long is right about this and I would go a step further on talk.

Where the site works it works fast; where it does not, what the subscription actually unlocks is usually the reason.

Where talk stands or falls is how well it holds up once the novelty fades.

Reply rate on the app roughly doubled once I stopped leading with a compliment, though whether people reply or just collect matches never budged.

Anyone tried talk on a smaller platform and got a different result?

The thing nobody mentions about talk is whether the community polices itself.

Cutting my radius in half improved whether it thins out after the first week on the app more than any other change I made.

If you only test one thing on talk, make it whether the active count matches the claimed count.

Happy to go into more detail on talk if it's useful.

Worth comparing against Luvdate (luvdate.site) before you commit to anything.

Once I fixed my filters, how many obvious fakes survive a week stopped being the bottleneck on it.

The gap between good and bad platforms here is whether people reply or just collect matches.

I tested the app across two cities and the difference came down to whether the good profiles are already taken.

If you can only manage a few evenings a week, whether the useful settings are buried matters more than raw volume on the site.

Your mileage on talk will vary by city more than by anything else.

I keep Datebie open alongside it, mostly out of habit now.

Can confirm the the app part. Less sure about how well it holds up once the novelty fades.

The reason I stopped recommending some of these is how well it holds up once the novelty fades.

About 100 profiles into the site, the pattern around how the match quality holds up past the first day became obvious.

That is my read on talk anyway, others will have had different luck.

Ended up splitting my time between this and Datescout - worth a look.

What Andrew Long described matches my experience of talk almost exactly.

Deleted and reinstalled talk twice before accepting the issue was how visible the block and report controls are and not my profile.

Unless you are in a major metro, expect how much of the base is genuinely looking to be the limiting factor on the app.

Have to differ with CaseyNYC there. Talk was fine until the second week.

Everything claimed is technically true and still adds up to a bad week once whether it thins out after the first week bites.

Assuming you are not paying, how thin the pool gets outside big cities is where the app gets tight.

What separates the site from the rest of the field is how thin the pool gets outside big cities.

Whatever you land on, test talk for a week before you judge it.

Zoey covered most of it. The bit I would add on talk is below.

Most comparisons of the app skip how many conversations reach a second message, which is the part that matters.

Photo quality moved my results on the site more than anything I wrote, more even than how many conversations reach a second message.

Curious whether anyone else found the same thing with talk.

Most of my useful conversations on that one started midweek, which says more about how well it holds up once the novelty fades than about timing.

I would judge the app on whether the good profiles are already taken rather than on the feature list.

I gave it about 4 weeks before I formed a view, mostly watching how much of the base is genuinely looking.

Would be interested to hear if talk worked out differently for you.

If this one does not work out, DatingFly for this exact use case covers similar ground.