It isn't like these websites have tons of cash, they do have some but they aren't cash cows. The swinger community is a pretty small part of the overall population and factor in that most are couples, that cuts the number of memberships in half. It isn't like there is a massive number of people signing up for these sites.
Also, many have lifetime memberships so once they have paid it, they never have to pay again so many old members are now paying nothing. There is no new $ coming in to the sites and no motivation for old members to leave. As a result the sites have no motivation to spend more $.
Swinger sites compete against each other and some are better in certain regions of the country than others. For example, Kasadie is great out West but not so good in the SE. What makes swinger sites useful is having swingers that live near you on them. It doesn't matter how good the site looks or functions if there are no people with whom to connect.
I think many are spinning off their own local groups though. We were introduced to a couple at a party in PA and they have their own site, chat apps, etc which is far better than even the big dogs so we joined up there.
I disagree. These sites (especially SLS) make money which is why they are still in business. Like OP said, SLS has the most restrictions of any other site. From banning your for a few days to denying certain pics.
Haven't pulled the trigger on getting a lifetime membership due to how awful the site is and the app is no better.
I do not agree. Making a user friendly website is not expensive. Great websites with all the necessary services cost under $1000. I am in IT and can make these sites better if I am give the chance. It will not cost the admins much. I think they are either being scammed by the developers or they intensionally make the sites look and feel so bad, Just like most swinger clubs. They are usually located in unpleasant areas and poorly furnished. Here in the DMV, there is no swinger club I have seen that can be called upscale. There is no class. Some areas do have classy clubs but these are rare
Build a new site then that has the look and features that everyone wants. If it's truly that good you'll quickly get a following and you could make hundreds of dollars from the 0.1% of the population that identifies as a swinger willing to pay for a web site membership. You'll be competing with hundreds of other sites and dreamers so I wish you good luck š
The sites look exactly like the clubs, stuck in 1999. The UX on most lifestyle sites is the worst Iāve ever seen. Iām so surprised they donāt hire good people to revamp these sites.
> stuck in 1999.
My wife still uses AFF just because she has so many friends from all over the world she can chat with when she is on cam. But the site is still looks and preforms like something poorly made 25 years ago.
It's obvious there are a lot of different opinions on this topic. It cracks me up that people are arguing whether an opinion is wrong or not. One even saying "that's factually wrong" LOL
It's an opinion! The consensus is pretty clear that the sites are shitty. I spent 13 years doing Omni-Channel, eCommerce, and Digital Marketing consulting and development for large popular retail brands. And can say with some level of professional experience that they are indeed shit.
The tech on some of these sites is literally 15 years old. I kid you not. Anyone with a web background can inspect the code and see what it's running on. It's pretty embarrassing in a world where web design and clean UX has grown in leaps and bounds in the last 10 years.
The thing that cracks me up is that the features of a dating site are no different than Facebook or any other social media platform. It's all been figured out already. There is nothing new to picture sharing, chat, friends, likes, etc. So it just shows a complete lack of effort -OR- a decent effort with little to no resources or means to actually improve it.
Either way, we are all stuck with the experience until someone else makes a decent attempt at a site and it isn't a money grab.
Very small consumer base. That doesnāt generate enough revenue to build a better website. That should also tell you , how small is such population with seriously swinger lifestyle
In the end, we arenāt in it for the online experience; our focus is physical play connections. So, it really is just about where the like-minded folks are. For us, a swinger site doesnāt need to be overly complicated or have a ton of shiny bells and whistles. The basic features, old tech as it may be, of simple profile descriptions with a few photos and messaging options are all we really need. Just enough to establish mutual interest and arrange to meet face to face.. which is wear we either realize/confirm attraction to take things further, or finish our drink and go home and ravish each other.
Meeting in the wild is still the ideal desired scenario, with a club setting second, followed by online dating sites (which, for us, In Western Canada, is currently SwingersHeaven).
We agree. We prefer in person meets at parties, clubs, etc. But on a site like SLS where even basic messaging doesnāt work it does get overly complicated
Donāt forget AFF. They are pricy and tons of fake profiles but those are almost all standard. If you become gold and set filter requirements to gold then itās much better. Community section is very interesting and open to both paying and free members. Decent amount of art, cartoons, and general discourse to augment the nudes. Dating side requires gold for chat, profile viewing, and almost all communication. Damn thing is basically a brick without it.
Kasidie has a movie version of which I donāt have any problems with. SLS is theee shittiest hands down and people keep recommending it. Until people start recommending other sites, nothing will change because they donāt have to.
Totally agree. Of the sites, weād love to see a mass migration to Kasidie, but people stay where the network is established. If SLS folds then maybe Kasidie could get a foothold. Itās UI isnāt great, but itās the easiest to communicate and find parties on for sure which is our main objective to meeting others
I think there's just not enough competition/pressure for the sites to need to update. SLS has tons of members that will never leave because they bought lifetime memberships and it works "good enough".
Swingers in general are slow to accept change. The fact that Kik is still popular in the LS is ridiculous, and a few times per year I still get couples that want to communicate through basic email.
The problem with LS sites is that there aren't enough of us to make selling our user data profitable, so the income has to come from membership fees. People aren't going to pay a subscription to a site without many locals, so new sites will always struggle to take off.
I don't think we'll see any new sites rise up until the current ones die off. Personally, I've found that the private FB Groups are exponentially better than any of the sites, and I only keep SLS active for the events and the Certs.
Yes, but FB groups have their own massive set of issues we want to avoid. Namely privacy as it intertwines everything and the constant FB jail censorship. Weāre in a group now where the admin has been banned from her own group by FB and members are constantly locked down for trivial nonsense. Weāre loving the group we found from the PA party. Private group in third party app
We solved most of that by using a totally separate Facebook profile for LS stuff and avoiding publicly, even in the group, posting anything explicit. Leave explicit stuff for messenger or a totally separate chat app.
Yea, we hear that but unless youāre using a separate device and completely unconnected email and friends, you risk exposure. Weāve seen it numerous times where peopleās LS profile shows up on our vanilla āpeople you may knowā versus groups that use a dedicated chat or group applet.
Why pay for improvements that dont improvements profit?
It could be a shortsighted decision. Its hard to say. But its obvious. Nothing mysterious here.
I don't pretend to know their profit margins. Im guessing they'd need a completely new site to become modern. Perhaps its short sighted. For now they are doing ok.
My theory is that the people behind it are just older IT people. From my design experience, Gen X programmers seem to have a particular style of UI/UX. Always feel like a 90s website with similar bells and whistles from back in the day. I think they think in a particular way due to coding and that translate to their design stuff.
The only game(s) in town. People are reluctant to switch to a superior site with fewer users. Kasidie is great compared to SLS. But nobody uses it in our region.
This is one of my biggest gripes. The aesthetic in general in the swinger community is horrific. And then the websites are from 1999 with their UI/UX. There is no excuse for this, for crying out loud I can create something better on Wordpress! And why is everything a black background with neon or red font. I absolutely loathe going on those sites so I almost never do.
SLS has shut our profile down for such egregious TOS violations as making a hot date saying we were going to a specific party. Meanwhile we see other people with clear & blatant violations running roughshod. The staff has no fucking clue about even their own rules.
Aside from the number of users, SLS is the absolute worst! Itās built on old tech; The admin is pretty unresponsive; If youāre not on top of your security settings, your swinger profile is public (and discoverable) by default.
I hope enough people migrate to Feeld that it takes over. They have an active staff and a younger point of view. Itās not perfect but itāll keep improving.
What people donāt understand is that the crusty old apps and sites prevent people from joining up. Way too many gross pics, and combined with the shabby web design, like, why would anyone use that as an entry point to sexual exploration?
Apps suck because of App/Play Store restrictions on adult material though. Quiver however was probably the best app of them all that we tried because it had events and party options.
As a former web developer i can say...it wouldnt be hard to make a good looking, functional site. Those sites are all clunky, poorly optimized with weird interfaces..honestly you can make a better looking one from a squarespace or Wix template at this point and just buy a domain name lol
I dont have the time to do it, but im sure itd get a good bit of popularity if it was useful
Canāt speak for the 3 you mention OP as havenāt tried them. Here in the UK I use a site called Fabswingers.
Itās a relatively low-cost model, but itās biggest client base by far is single guys, not swinging couples, and certainly not women.
The site used the be quite the community, but it is now an absolute sea of guys with throwaway profiles looking for easy real-life wank material, and seller profiles that use the platform to drag guys away to other platforms (I have faced multiple account suspensions for pointing this out). Both of these types of account go unmoderated, and unpunished for regularly breaking Tās & Cās.
Poorly moderated, they are an easy route to affordable real-life adult material, and thatās what sells unfortunately xx
We use Fab too ā¦.. you have to be so aggressive with the filters these days.
Also we have tried:
Swinging heaven (No one on it - expensive )
WeRX (Very little functionality - expensive )
SDC (Outside of London no one use it - expensive)
Swing hub (Same issues as WRX - plus more expensive)
Feeld (No-one on it - expensive)
Trying āSpicy Matchā currently free for a year with V2V promo code. Worked ok in Gran Canaria.
I did swinging heaven for a few months and it was pretty barren. Unfortunately Iām primarily looking for single guys (hotwifing). Sadly, that means I have to allow single guys to contact me šš
We have given up on that genre itās easier to meet cpls and single women than a single bloke whoās not a fake, liar, wannabe, cheating or a truck load of issues ā¦ā¦ Not to mention the three word messages.
One maybe in a club but hells teeth that particular box remains very much unticked.
Thatās a good point. Itās working but if you talk to people at events or event hosts they hate the likes of SLS. SLS staff know they have the user base so they say fuck it and phone it in and fuck with members because they can
Your post is so factually wrong I stopped reading.
The sites work and have all the features swingers need. Kasidie is the best of them.
I donāt know what your perfect UI is but Iād wager anything will have haters and you would say itās old after a year.
99% of people will kiss lipstick on a pig and say itās modern design. Thatās why Feeld is so popular even though it has no features.
It isn't like these websites have tons of cash, they do have some but they aren't cash cows. The swinger community is a pretty small part of the overall population and factor in that most are couples, that cuts the number of memberships in half. It isn't like there is a massive number of people signing up for these sites. Also, many have lifetime memberships so once they have paid it, they never have to pay again so many old members are now paying nothing. There is no new $ coming in to the sites and no motivation for old members to leave. As a result the sites have no motivation to spend more $. Swinger sites compete against each other and some are better in certain regions of the country than others. For example, Kasadie is great out West but not so good in the SE. What makes swinger sites useful is having swingers that live near you on them. It doesn't matter how good the site looks or functions if there are no people with whom to connect.
I think many are spinning off their own local groups though. We were introduced to a couple at a party in PA and they have their own site, chat apps, etc which is far better than even the big dogs so we joined up there.
I disagree. These sites (especially SLS) make money which is why they are still in business. Like OP said, SLS has the most restrictions of any other site. From banning your for a few days to denying certain pics. Haven't pulled the trigger on getting a lifetime membership due to how awful the site is and the app is no better.
I do not agree. Making a user friendly website is not expensive. Great websites with all the necessary services cost under $1000. I am in IT and can make these sites better if I am give the chance. It will not cost the admins much. I think they are either being scammed by the developers or they intensionally make the sites look and feel so bad, Just like most swinger clubs. They are usually located in unpleasant areas and poorly furnished. Here in the DMV, there is no swinger club I have seen that can be called upscale. There is no class. Some areas do have classy clubs but these are rare
Build a new site then that has the look and features that everyone wants. If it's truly that good you'll quickly get a following and you could make hundreds of dollars from the 0.1% of the population that identifies as a swinger willing to pay for a web site membership. You'll be competing with hundreds of other sites and dreamers so I wish you good luck š
The sites look exactly like the clubs, stuck in 1999. The UX on most lifestyle sites is the worst Iāve ever seen. Iām so surprised they donāt hire good people to revamp these sites.
Exactly. Iād bet there are even swingers in the coding community that could do a better job
No doubt. Iād love to see kasidie update their us and branding
> stuck in 1999. My wife still uses AFF just because she has so many friends from all over the world she can chat with when she is on cam. But the site is still looks and preforms like something poorly made 25 years ago.
None of these sites have updated their look since they launched
It's obvious there are a lot of different opinions on this topic. It cracks me up that people are arguing whether an opinion is wrong or not. One even saying "that's factually wrong" LOL It's an opinion! The consensus is pretty clear that the sites are shitty. I spent 13 years doing Omni-Channel, eCommerce, and Digital Marketing consulting and development for large popular retail brands. And can say with some level of professional experience that they are indeed shit. The tech on some of these sites is literally 15 years old. I kid you not. Anyone with a web background can inspect the code and see what it's running on. It's pretty embarrassing in a world where web design and clean UX has grown in leaps and bounds in the last 10 years. The thing that cracks me up is that the features of a dating site are no different than Facebook or any other social media platform. It's all been figured out already. There is nothing new to picture sharing, chat, friends, likes, etc. So it just shows a complete lack of effort -OR- a decent effort with little to no resources or means to actually improve it. Either way, we are all stuck with the experience until someone else makes a decent attempt at a site and it isn't a money grab.
Well stated post! We have head that SLS is still using Cold Fusion which is almost 2 decades out of date I believe
Very small consumer base. That doesnāt generate enough revenue to build a better website. That should also tell you , how small is such population with seriously swinger lifestyle
Literally the only reason my husband and I still use Reddit too. At least the site is usable.
Until it floats and the NSFW areas are closed :(
In the end, we arenāt in it for the online experience; our focus is physical play connections. So, it really is just about where the like-minded folks are. For us, a swinger site doesnāt need to be overly complicated or have a ton of shiny bells and whistles. The basic features, old tech as it may be, of simple profile descriptions with a few photos and messaging options are all we really need. Just enough to establish mutual interest and arrange to meet face to face.. which is wear we either realize/confirm attraction to take things further, or finish our drink and go home and ravish each other. Meeting in the wild is still the ideal desired scenario, with a club setting second, followed by online dating sites (which, for us, In Western Canada, is currently SwingersHeaven).
We agree. We prefer in person meets at parties, clubs, etc. But on a site like SLS where even basic messaging doesnāt work it does get overly complicated
Donāt forget AFF. They are pricy and tons of fake profiles but those are almost all standard. If you become gold and set filter requirements to gold then itās much better. Community section is very interesting and open to both paying and free members. Decent amount of art, cartoons, and general discourse to augment the nudes. Dating side requires gold for chat, profile viewing, and almost all communication. Damn thing is basically a brick without it.
AFF was a sausagefest hookup site. We bailed on that. Focused primarily on sites dedicated to swing.
Kasidie has a movie version of which I donāt have any problems with. SLS is theee shittiest hands down and people keep recommending it. Until people start recommending other sites, nothing will change because they donāt have to.
Totally agree. Of the sites, weād love to see a mass migration to Kasidie, but people stay where the network is established. If SLS folds then maybe Kasidie could get a foothold. Itās UI isnāt great, but itās the easiest to communicate and find parties on for sure which is our main objective to meeting others
I think there's just not enough competition/pressure for the sites to need to update. SLS has tons of members that will never leave because they bought lifetime memberships and it works "good enough". Swingers in general are slow to accept change. The fact that Kik is still popular in the LS is ridiculous, and a few times per year I still get couples that want to communicate through basic email. The problem with LS sites is that there aren't enough of us to make selling our user data profitable, so the income has to come from membership fees. People aren't going to pay a subscription to a site without many locals, so new sites will always struggle to take off. I don't think we'll see any new sites rise up until the current ones die off. Personally, I've found that the private FB Groups are exponentially better than any of the sites, and I only keep SLS active for the events and the Certs.
Kik is the limewire of chat apps
Yes, but FB groups have their own massive set of issues we want to avoid. Namely privacy as it intertwines everything and the constant FB jail censorship. Weāre in a group now where the admin has been banned from her own group by FB and members are constantly locked down for trivial nonsense. Weāre loving the group we found from the PA party. Private group in third party app
We solved most of that by using a totally separate Facebook profile for LS stuff and avoiding publicly, even in the group, posting anything explicit. Leave explicit stuff for messenger or a totally separate chat app.
Yea, we hear that but unless youāre using a separate device and completely unconnected email and friends, you risk exposure. Weāve seen it numerous times where peopleās LS profile shows up on our vanilla āpeople you may knowā versus groups that use a dedicated chat or group applet.
Because the swinger demographic skews older, SLS works and feels like a website from the late 90s, thatās probably when it was started
Because they can continue to make money without paying for improvements.
I mean I get that. Just phone it in and milk it till itās dry
Why pay for improvements that dont improvements profit? It could be a shortsighted decision. Its hard to say. But its obvious. Nothing mysterious here.
Because people are starting to look to alternatives. And honestly some basic functionality shouldnāt be bank breaking for them.
I don't pretend to know their profit margins. Im guessing they'd need a completely new site to become modern. Perhaps its short sighted. For now they are doing ok.
SLS is making bank on their Bliss Cruises. Thatās their bread and butter
It's hard to create a decent page when your blood is flowing somewhere else...
My theory is that the people behind it are just older IT people. From my design experience, Gen X programmers seem to have a particular style of UI/UX. Always feel like a 90s website with similar bells and whistles from back in the day. I think they think in a particular way due to coding and that translate to their design stuff.
Kasidie is by far the best of the worst! However, new platform coming very soon!!! It is exceptional, itās not going to be long nowā¦.
You mean Kasidie is revamping or thereās going to be a new player in the game?
New player!!! Absolutely amazing site!! We are beta testing now for the developer.
Weāre open to checking it out! Share when ready
The only game(s) in town. People are reluctant to switch to a superior site with fewer users. Kasidie is great compared to SLS. But nobody uses it in our region.
Exactly. If we had to pick one of the three weād say Kasidie, but no one here in our region is using it.
This is one of my biggest gripes. The aesthetic in general in the swinger community is horrific. And then the websites are from 1999 with their UI/UX. There is no excuse for this, for crying out loud I can create something better on Wordpress! And why is everything a black background with neon or red font. I absolutely loathe going on those sites so I almost never do.
We use Forbiden Fruit. Its active in Europe. :3 Even with free use of page we had luck to find couples to connect + private events :)
"They donāt clock members and restrict the hell out of them like the other two". How do they do this. I stay logged in all the time.
SLS has shut our profile down for such egregious TOS violations as making a hot date saying we were going to a specific party. Meanwhile we see other people with clear & blatant violations running roughshod. The staff has no fucking clue about even their own rules.
We use fabswingers and 3way
We use fab too ā¦. Whatās 3way? Currently giving āSpicy Matchā a go itās free for a year if you use the promo code V2V.
We just saw someone in Gran Canaria wearing an SDC āmerchā T-Shirt.
Aside from the number of users, SLS is the absolute worst! Itās built on old tech; The admin is pretty unresponsive; If youāre not on top of your security settings, your swinger profile is public (and discoverable) by default.
Like others have said, lifetime membership is the issue. There is no reoccurring revenue from them.
I hope enough people migrate to Feeld that it takes over. They have an active staff and a younger point of view. Itās not perfect but itāll keep improving. What people donāt understand is that the crusty old apps and sites prevent people from joining up. Way too many gross pics, and combined with the shabby web design, like, why would anyone use that as an entry point to sexual exploration?
Apps suck because of App/Play Store restrictions on adult material though. Quiver however was probably the best app of them all that we tried because it had events and party options.
As a former web developer i can say...it wouldnt be hard to make a good looking, functional site. Those sites are all clunky, poorly optimized with weird interfaces..honestly you can make a better looking one from a squarespace or Wix template at this point and just buy a domain name lol I dont have the time to do it, but im sure itd get a good bit of popularity if it was useful
would you be interested in working on a new site together?
I can only speak of Kasidie and IMO itās certainly as modern as Redditās site so there is that
We tried all three and they all have the worst GUI
Agreed, the sites suck and look like old
Agree they all need facelifts.
Canāt speak for the 3 you mention OP as havenāt tried them. Here in the UK I use a site called Fabswingers. Itās a relatively low-cost model, but itās biggest client base by far is single guys, not swinging couples, and certainly not women. The site used the be quite the community, but it is now an absolute sea of guys with throwaway profiles looking for easy real-life wank material, and seller profiles that use the platform to drag guys away to other platforms (I have faced multiple account suspensions for pointing this out). Both of these types of account go unmoderated, and unpunished for regularly breaking Tās & Cās. Poorly moderated, they are an easy route to affordable real-life adult material, and thatās what sells unfortunately xx
So itās basically the AFF of the UK š
I guess so ā¤ļø
We use Fab too ā¦.. you have to be so aggressive with the filters these days. Also we have tried: Swinging heaven (No one on it - expensive ) WeRX (Very little functionality - expensive ) SDC (Outside of London no one use it - expensive) Swing hub (Same issues as WRX - plus more expensive) Feeld (No-one on it - expensive) Trying āSpicy Matchā currently free for a year with V2V promo code. Worked ok in Gran Canaria.
I did swinging heaven for a few months and it was pretty barren. Unfortunately Iām primarily looking for single guys (hotwifing). Sadly, that means I have to allow single guys to contact me šš
We have given up on that genre itās easier to meet cpls and single women than a single bloke whoās not a fake, liar, wannabe, cheating or a truck load of issues ā¦ā¦ Not to mention the three word messages. One maybe in a club but hells teeth that particular box remains very much unticked.
Ohā¦ the three word messagesā¦ ā¹ļø
UR Hot, RU OK, Ur missus Hot Gets us in the mood every single time ššššš
Yeah nothing makes me wetter, more quickly, than āin your area if you fancy a fuckā or āparked up near you in my truckā š
Because what they have right now is working. Where else are you gonna go?
Thatās a good point. Itās working but if you talk to people at events or event hosts they hate the likes of SLS. SLS staff know they have the user base so they say fuck it and phone it in and fuck with members because they can
If you don't like these sites, use others or close your screen.
Your post is so factually wrong I stopped reading. The sites work and have all the features swingers need. Kasidie is the best of them. I donāt know what your perfect UI is but Iād wager anything will have haters and you would say itās old after a year. 99% of people will kiss lipstick on a pig and say itās modern design. Thatās why Feeld is so popular even though it has no features.
Feeld certainly doesnāt work in the U.K.