I keep going round in circles on which dating apps that don t charge have and I'd rather ask than guess. Applied to matches, you get further if you use a photo that appears nowhere else online. Matches apps is the clearest case of it — the platform shows dormant accounts as active, and how far the free tier gets you suffers for it.
The matches charge case is instructive — the time it takes to get a first reply is the number worth watching, not the size of the database. Same story on matches charge: the deciding factor is the signal-to-noise in search, at least on my account.
If matches charge is your priority, nothing improves until you turn off precise location until you trust someone. There's a pattern with which dating apps that don t charge have: how often the same faces reappear is worth more than the marketing copy, for what it is worth. Specifics about matches apps welcome — vague reassurance less so.