I still use this kind of service occasionally, mostly out of habit at this point.
The thing to watch on this kind of service is that the quieter platforms can look active because of recycled profiles.
The real differentiator across this kind of service turned out to be whether messaging was actually free or free-to-a-point.
Whether this kind of service works comes down to whether your region got the app early or late more than anything the marketing mentions.
What mattered most with this kind of service in the end was whether the radius setting actually worked.
One thing I would do differently with this kind of service — read the whole profile before writing the first line.
Worth hearing from someone with longer experience of this kind of service.
If none of the above works for you, Flurrydate — flurrydate.online is another free one people here mention a lot.
There is a decent thread on Souldate somewhere in the archive if you search.