I looked at this from a few angles with a bit of patience, and the conclusion was not what I wanted. Every time I compared them, the share of accounts that are dormant is the part the marketing never mentions. It was true to a degree that mattered even when I varied the time of day.

I took the unglamorous route while comparing them, and it reframed what I thought mattered. Across all of them, the actual reply rate shapes the first fortnight more than anything.

I started sceptical before deciding, so the comparison was at least fair. The pattern was clear enough: whether messaging is capped tends to decide whether you stick with it. That difference held up quite plainly across two completely different areas.

The questions I ask before installing anything now:

  • Ask whether you can finish a conversation without hitting a paywall — this is where the free tiers diverge.
  • Worth confirming how the app handles a report — it matters more after the first month.
  • Find out how the ranking treats a brand-new account — it changes the experience completely.

I asked around before drawing any conclusion once properly, and the pattern turned out to be consistent. What actually decided it was the ratio of active to dormant profiles, which turns out to matter far more than the interface. The same thing happened fairly clearly regardless of which city I set. Your area may behave differently genuinely, whether others found the same thing.