Nearly every dating site on the internet claims to offer free dating. Running a quick search on google for the phrase 'free dating' returns some one and half million results!

Yet is the consumer being mislead? What are the true costs of free dating?

The fact is there is rarely any such thing. Free dating often means the ability to post a profile and recieve messages from members but here the word 'free' stops. If a member wishes to contact other members, read messages and use additional features other than merely posting a profile they must 'upgrade' their account and this of course comes at a cost.

Is the consumer being mislead? In a way yes. These sites are not really offering free dating, rather the ability to post a profile - if you actually want to use the dating service, that is interact with other members then you must pay an 'upgrade fee'.

At the same time however it is important to remember the old saying that nothing in life comes free. For the website owner running, maintaining and advertising a dating site costs money and often lots of it. Some of the top dating sites are paying nearly 0.70 per click to advertise their sites - these clicks can quickly add up and lead to spirally costs. To cover these costs they must therefore introduces some sort of subscription fee.

The alternative of course is to offer a free dating site supported by advertising. Unfortunatley the advertising revenue derived from these sites is often far below costs. The consumer ends up suffering in terms of obtrusive advertisng banners or a poor quality service.

The answer then is that there is no such thing as 'free dating'. That is not to say however the consumer should not shop around. With a vast choice of online dating sites the consumer is in a good positon to seek out the best deal. Often they can benefit from trial free offers or some sites even offer completely free membership to a specific type of user.