Online dating was the domain of the gay community long before it ever hit the mainstream. The same can also be said of the Australian LGBT community: now there is a plethora of gay and lesbian dating sites and apps available to help those looking for same-sex love.
In all honesty, there are in fact almost too many out there! So we’ve only gathered a few of the best ones to help you find your partner. Of course, there’s more than just matchmaking here, casual dating is also on offer…
Gay Dating Sites Tips
Location is important when searching! With gay dating you need to keep location in mind when searching for singles: these sites don’t have as many members as “straight” dating sites – so expand your search!
In-depth profile! If you are looking for more than just sex then expand your profile on gay dating sites. Explain what you are looking for so you’re seen as more than just a pretty face!
GayMatchmaker.com.au is a dating site that focuses on single gay men in Australia: but it is much more than that. Since 2002, it has been bringing gay singles together for friendship, fun and dating and is even politically active when it comes to gay and LGBT rights. GayMatchmaker over 300,000 members!
GayMatchmaker is also a part of the larger casual dating site AdultMatchmaker, giving it full access to a consistently growing database of 2,500,000Australian users.
Costs:
You can create a trial membership at GayMatchmaker for free.
If you wish to communicate and take part in events, subscription starts at $12.91/month.
LesbianMatchmaker counts among Australia’s largest lesbian communities. Anyone looking for new contacts here will not be alone for long! And it’s all the same whether you are looking for a casual date, a relationship or simply friends.
During our tests we counted approximately 100,000 members!
Online dating agency and matchmaking site EliteSingles also offers its services to the gay and lesbian singles. Unlike a lot of gay dating sites in this category, the focus here is on finding a serious partner. With 18,000 members joining every day in Australia, your chances of finding someone are considerably high.
While 71% of singles here are university graduates, you do not necessarily have to have gone to uni join. The main focus is on finding a quality partner and not academics (thought there are a lot of academics here too...).
The jewel in EliteSingles' crown is its Personality Test. It examines singles on 29 personality traits in order to send "contact proposals". You will receive 10 of these each day, allowing you to build meaningful connections.
Costs:
Take the EliteSingles personality test and receive partner suggestions for free.
In order to communicate with your matches, subscription prices begin at $22.95/month.
RSVP.com.au is not strictly a gay or lesbian online personals site: but it isn't strictly a straight one, either. Rather, the focus here is on meeting new people based on your dating preferences. As a result, there are services available for people of all sexual orientations. Pegged as Australia's "number one dating site", there are about 1,200 new members joining every day. Not bad!
On RSVP you simply describes what you are looking for in a partner the kind of person you would like to date. There is a very long list of criteria, as well as criteria that you can choose not to compromise on. These are referred to as "deal breakers".
Costs:
Signing up is free, as is creating a profile, searching members and replying to emails.
For Priority membership which bestows extra features, membership begins at $14/month.
Gay.com is the largest gay and lesbian online dating site and at the moment has 3 million active worldwide members. Gay.com is part of the Here Media Inc. network of companies, which produces and distributes niche content across all platforms worldwide (such as The Advocate, the world’s leading gay news source; Out, the world’s leading gay fashion and lifestyle brand and SheWired.com, the world’s fastest-growing site for women gay, straight, and in between). As such, Gay.com offers, in addition to online dating, other gay community related information, entertainment, live chat, photo library, news...
The thriving social networking component allows the gay members to chat, instant message, or share photos and videos in a safe environment.
Gay.com has the nicest web design that we've come across among the gay dating sites.
You can use the IM, send messages, send friend requests, add to hot list, block, add notes...
You can even join group chat, send private IMs and watch some videos for free.
You'll find advertisements of their other products (The Advocate, Out...) throughout the site, which could either be irritating or a nice supplement to the site.
Cupid Media is a market leader in many of its international markets and niche dating sites, one of them being the lesbian dating market. Overall, Cupid Media can boast around 30 million profiles on all of their websites.
It has a modern, user-friendly design, with multi-lingual interface and translation tools that break-down barriers enabling you to find other lesbian singles, whether locally in the UK or worldwide.
You can browse lesbian singles profiles and communicate with them via chat, email, video or instant messaging.
On your profile page you get possible matches according to your criteria. One thing we find outstanding is that they try to educate members about scammers and how to protect themselves against them.
Gaydar.net has been the home of over 6 million gay, bi and curious guys for the last ten years.
Modern design with lots of functionalities such as "send winks", express your opinion about another guy ("he's hot", "he's nice", "would like to get to know", "likes me!", "not my type", send messages, block a user, see photos and videos, GPS locations, travel plans...
You can take it with you wherever you are with the GaydarMobile app. Members pay with a 'Pay As You Cruise' method.
There are some relative big advertisements there, but they are usually topic related.
It can be a bit confusing for some people that you can only access the products and payments application after you are logged in to one of their other applications (which is not very clearly specified.)
GayRomeo.com, also known as PlanetRomeo, started locally as a small network of friends in Berlin and has become one of the main sites for the gay and bisexual male and transgender community worldwide hosting 6 million registered users.
Health is an important aspect for the owners of GayRomeo.com, that's why they partnered with leading specialist health advice organisations in various countries to deliver clear information and advice on PlanetRomeo.
They even created the charity “PlanetRomeo Foundation” to give support to a number of gay community projects and good causes.
The operators receive around 100 faker reports from users every day and they say that they deactivate or delete around 2/3 of those profiles. Keep this in mind and help them maintain a real community by reporting other fakes.
You can check the activities guide to keep updated about what's going on in your area and take it with you with the Gayromeo mobile application.
The design seems a bit robotic to us and could have a better user interface. Also, don't expect as many Australian members as at the other main gay dating sites.
Costs:
Although you can do some things for free, not everything is free.
The full access to all features costs from US$3.74/month.
Manhunt is probably one of the oldest gay dating sites out there and is exclusively aimed at gay and bisexual men. Unlike Gay-Parship, it's focus appears to be more on sex and general hookups. Members seem to sit around the 4,000,000 mark, though the number of profiles still active will probably be different.
Costs:
Signing up to Manhunt.net is free.
For unlimited membership, costs begin from US$12.00/month.
OnlyLads.com is a gay dating site for gay and bisexual men in Australia. It is probably one of the newer free dating sites aimed at LGBT men in the United Kingdom. With around 750,000 members, the site claims to be completely "gay owned and operated".
At present the OnlyLads.com app version is still undergoing work: at least if you are an iOS and iPhone user. For those with Android systems, there is already one available so you can cruise on the go. What’s also useful is that OnlyLads is mobile and tablet friendly.
