Been lurking here for a bit but finally decided to post about this.
The free tiers on most of what I've tried are basically useless. You get just enough to see that real people are there, then hit a wall the second you try to actually message anyone.
Safety and privacy are also big concerns for me. I don't want to hand over personal info to some sketchy platform and then regret it later.
Looking for real opinions here, not just the same top-ten list everyone copies from each other.