LoveHowTo Dating Directory: Intimate/Sex
"Dating" may not be the right term for these sites. If you're looking for a hookup, a booty call or a "friends with benefits" relationship, jump in here.
Intimate/Sex Services
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Audience & Features: intimate, million+ members, straight, gay, lesbian, couples, married, BDSM Pricing
Try Adult Friend Finder 32 million members. Billed as "The World's Largest Sex & Swinger Personals Community," AFF boasts 20 million members. One endorsement says, "If you want to get laid this is the site to go to." Pretty straightforward. Pretty true, too. Owned by Various LLC.
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Audience & Features: intimate, million+ members, straight, gay, lesbian, couples, video, BDSM Pricing
Try Fling.com Wow. Lots of action here. Features include video chat, but really the photos are almost more than most people could handle. These people know what they want and aren't afraid to ask for it. You've been warned. 22 million unique visitors a month.
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Users of this site are open about their likes ("someone who is sexually secure in herself, with extra points if she is bi or bi curious"), abilities ("I can touch my nose with my tongue") and who they're looking for ("the nicest guy ever with a gorgeous smile, a big heart and big hands"). Sexual proclivities are the primary defining elements, but there are plenty of people just seeking a good old-fashioned soul mate with a sense of humor - and a dirty mind. A low percentage of photos, which could mean they're married or just technically backwards. All the erection-pill ads get to be a little tiresome.
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2 million members. Canadian-based service dedicated to helping married people cheat. The slogan? "When monogamy becomes monotony." The site requires you to purchase credits if you want to read emails or follow up with potential...partners. Many profiles without photos ("Please respect my discretionary requirements"), for obvious reasons. There's some good reading here, whether or not you ever initiate contact.
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Audience & Features: intimate, married, straight, gay, lesbian couples Pricing
Try DiscreetAdventures.com Primarily targeting married people looking for affairs. Or as they put it, "an anonymous, discreet and safe way for attached women and men to find a secret love affair." This site asks you to check off what you like sexually when you create your profile. For example, "Interests" include "Extended Foreplay," "Spanking" and "Being Undressed Slowly." Pretty tame compared to some other sites in this category. And the profiles are also tamer, with members looking for Friends with Benefits and someone to help them cope with their loveless marriages. Sort of touching, except for that adultery element.
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Audience & Features: intimate, straight, gay, lesbian Pricing
Try Onlinebootycall "For singles who enjoy being single." This site is predicated on the concept that you can't find a soul mate online, so go for the sex. It has its own 10 commandments, including "Thou shalt not request advanced plans." So at least you're going in with your eyes open! Despite its name, Online Booty Call photos are in fact pretty tame in comparison to others in this category. These are normal people, except that they don't want to be called the next day.
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Audience & Features: intimate, straight, gay, lesbian, couples Pricing
Try Eroticy.com Eroticy was created by two women. Two very dirty women. The site features live sex cams, videos and photo galleries in addition to personal ads. Something for everyone.
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Audience & Features: intimate, straight, gay, lesbian, couples, BDSM, million+ members PricingTry SexSearch.com 15 million members, most of whom are more adept with photos than words. You can browse a few profiles for free, but then must upgrade to continue. The "Gold" level provides access to what SexSearch calls "The internet's largest hardcore porn site."
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Audience & Features: intimate, straight, gay, lesbian, million+ members, married, couples Pricing
Try Passion.com 20 million members. Duplicate of AdultFriendFinder database. Owned by Various LLC.
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Audience & Features: intimate, BDSM, straight, gay, lesbian, couples, video Pricing
Try SexPlayCam Tons of members, incredibly hot, even filthy, profiles, with photos and video galore. You'll find members looking for everything from tame to pervy, from NSA to a committed relationship. Whatever you're looking for, odds are it's here, in a site that's upbeat, easy to navigate and comprehensive. Wow!
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Audience & Features: intimate, straight, gay, lesbian, couples Pricing
Try CasualFriends.com Because profiles are created from a checklist and contain none of the members' own words, there's something sterile about this site. And here's something weird: they ask you to include a "price you want serious members to pay for meeting you for coffee." There are some other strange things here, like a Blog area that has virtually no action. In short, you can do better.
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Audience & Features: intimate, straight, gay, lesbian, free Pricing
Try Mate1 Some concerns about this one. While the people seem nice and sincere, we've heard that Mate1 can pull some tricky stuff when it comes to keeping men signed up. Overlapping ownership with EliteDate.com and sex site AmateurMatch.com.
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Other Services with Intimate Filtering
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Audience & Features: million+ members, straight, gay, lesbian, intimate, over 40 Pricing
Try Lavalife Primarily 18-34. You join in one, two or three categories (Dating, Relationship, Intimate). Since searches are done in single categories, this potentially limits who will see your profile. You can duplicate your profile but this seems like more work than should be necessary. While popular (5 million members), we found Lavalife to be more limited than other sites in their approach to creating profiles and the member base. Also, the same people hang in for way too long - where are the newbies?
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Audience & Features: free, million+ members, straight, gay, lesbian, intimate, over 40 PricingTry PlentyOfFish Truly, there are plenty of fish in the sea and they run the gamut from those who really buy into the whole fish metaphor ("I'm a Clown Fish...") to those who seemed to be in the neighborhood and figured they'd take a look. Diverse and responsive bunch but mediocre on the follow-through. Maybe you get what you pay for.
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Audience & Features: straight, gay, lesbian, intimate, BDSM, free, social networking PricingTry MySpace Search profiles by location, age, etc. Not a dating site but incredibly efficient. Just search geographically, by age, and/or interest to find future "friends."
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Audience & Features: straight, gay, lesbian, intimate, BDSM, free, social networking PricingTry Craigslist It's the directness of Craigslist personals that let you know exactly what you're getting. Sure, there are fakes, but when you can ask for whatever you want, when you want it, right down to the zip code, that's awesome power. Skews younger and more toward NSAs than LTRs, but it definitely is a major player. If you're in a major city, cut to the chase by going to http://hookupmaps.com and sorting by neighborhood as well as sexual preference.But if you want all the categories, including Strictly Platonic (strangely, some of the freakier listings show up here), Romance and Casual Encounters, you'll have to go to the source, Craigslist itself. Any way you look at it, a most efficient way to ask for what you want and get it quickly.
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It's in beta and you can tell: navigation is a bit frustrating. But the concept - selecting a photo out of an array to represent your feelings about various topics - is different and fun to do. A little more emphasis on geographical location and age would be nice. You end up with "favorites" who may live thousands of miles away.
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Claims 500,000 members and 10 years in business. Specializes in many different demographic groups. Probably not the best marketing idea: juxtaposing stock images of beautiful couples on the left with photos of "Actual Members" on the right side of the home page.
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Audience & Features: straight, gay, intimate Pricing
Try DreamMates.com A frustrating sign-up process that forces you to enter a phone number and opt out of third-party offers. Once you get in, the offerings are plentiful, but it's not the brightest crowd: probably more typos per capita than any other site - and that's saying something! Tries to be all things to all people, but the "intimate" side can't begin to compete with the dedicated intimate sites (see our section) and the lesbian members haven't been on in more than a year - guess they've moved on to other places. Owned by Vintacom Media/The Relationship Exchange.
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Audience & Features: million+ members, straight, gay, lesbian, intimate Pricing
Try EasyFlirt This international site claims 11 million+ members worldwide; it's not clear how many of those are in the U.S. The English is a little tortured (to sign up, you click a button that says "I become a member"), but it's an interesting crowd and definitely worth a try.
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"Thousands" of members. Alltel, AT&T, Boost, Cricket, Metro PCS, Midwest, Nextel, Sprint, T-Mobile, Verizon Wireless and Virgin Mobile. Allows you to text, flirt & connect with other singles.
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