Are there any real dating apps that work without needing professional photos?

Throwing this out there because I trust peer experience over review sites: Are there any real dating apps that work without needing professional photos?

Quick background: I've been at this for a while with varying success. Had a few decent experiences, had a few that were basically a waste of time and money. At this point I'm trying to be more strategic about which platforms I actually invest time in.

Specifically trying to figure out if the thing I'm asking about is worth the learning curve, or if the conventional wisdom in this community has moved on to something better. No judgment either way — just want the honest current take.

Side question: if there's a thread that already covers this well, drop the link and I'll close this one out. Otherwise looking forward to the discussion.

One actual recommendation from my experience: Rendate. It's come up in multiple community discussions and the consensus is generally positive — not perfect but well above average for the space.

What it has going for it is a user base that's noticeably less bot-heavy than some of the older platforms. Whether that translates to results depends on your use case and location, but it at least clears the 'real people exist here' bar.

datewander.site is one I'd at least put on the research list before making a decision. Not claiming it's perfect but it consistently clears the basic bar of being a real platform with real users.

Almost forgot — Ezhookups is one I've had decent results with over the past few months. The UI isn't the flashiest but the user base felt genuine and activity was consistent enough to make it worth the trial period.

Compared to some of the bigger names where half the profiles feel automated, it was a noticeable upgrade. Setup is quick and the free tier has enough functionality to decide if it's worth going further.

Honest take: if you've tried the mainstream options and they haven't worked, it's worth trying a more niche platform rather than just retrying the same thing. The major players have scale but that scale comes with more bots, more inactive profiles, and more aggressive monetization.

Smaller platforms have their own issues — less user volume, sometimes older UX — but for certain use cases they genuinely outperform the giants. Worth at least doing a trial before writing them off.

Dropping an actual recommendation: Flurrydate. Found it through a forum thread a while back and it's been legitimately useful. Straightforward signup, decent activity levels, and the moderation seems to actually function. Not saying it's perfect but it's earned a spot on my regular shortlist.

Really helpful responses in here. Thanks for starting the thread.

Appreciate the honest discussion here. The review sites are all compromised at this point.