Which dating shows actually lead to lasting love? We analyzed global hits like Love Island, Love Is Blind, and 90 Day Fiancé to reveal which series have the highest success rates.
Last Update17 Sep, 2025
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Dating shows…we’ve all watched them, and a few of us have maybe considered even giving them a go. But which one would you have the best chance of finding the love of your life on?
Do you think you’d have a better chance if you’re stuck on an island with plenty of eligible suitors for a few weeks, being taken on a blind date at the iconic ‘First Dates’ restaurant or if you skipped the awkward talking phase completely and met for the first time at the altar, à la ‘Married At First Sight’?.
Luckily for you, the team over at SlotsUp have all the answers you need! They’ve found some of the biggest dating shows from around the world and taken a look at just how successful they’ve been in their matchmaking efforts.
Topping the list is the U.S hit ‘90 Day Fiancé’ – which follows couples who have applied for a K-1 visa and now have…you guessed it, 90 days to get married. Whilst the premise of the show might seem a little questionable it clearly works, with the show having a 75% success rate.
Coming in second place is ‘Love Is Blind’ – the Netflix hit saw men and women dating in ‘pods’ where you could speak to one another, but not see them.
Love Is Blind dropped in February 2020, so considering the events of the following month…it was pretty ahead of its time.
After ten days, the men decided if they wanted to propose. If they did, cameras would follow the couples to a ‘couples retreat’ in Mexico, then as they moved into an apartment together – the final decision comes as they’re stood at the altar, will they stay or will they go?
Apparently, it was pretty successful since three of the six final couples are still together!
Whilst the U.S had the top four highest-ranking shows, it also had the two lowest. No couples from Love Island U.S have stayed together. ‘Too Hot To Handle’ – which was Netflix’s answer to ‘Love Island’ featured contestants from the U.S, U.K, and Australia and also saw a 0% success rate.
Love Island has become a staple of British summertime (and wintertime apparently, after Winter Love Island aired for the first time in 2020) and it’s no surprise that it topped the list for the U.K’s most successful dating shows.
10 out of the 43 final couples are still together, and there’s even been a few Love Island babies! Cara de la Hoyde and Nathan Massey – season 2 winners – welcomed their second child last summer whilst season 3 sweetheart Camilla Thurlow gave birth to a baby girl last year with partner Jamie Jewitt.
The latest season was the most successful, with 5 of the 8 couples still together.
Naked Attraction, which for anyone who isn’t aware of the show, is exactly what it sounds like – has one of the lowest success rates, with only 1 couple from the shows 80 dates still reported to be together. Maybe it is what’s on the inside that counts after all.
We already know that the U.S is home to some of the most successful dating shows – with 90 Day Fiance and Love Is Blind taking the top spots globally, but what about some of the other stateside dating shows?
The Bachelor is one of the longest-running dating shows in the game. Yet according to our findings, it’s one of the most unsuccessful, with only 1 of the final 25 couples still reported to be together. The Bachelorette has had a little more luck, with 5 out of 17 couples still together – giving it a 29% success rate. Maybe women have better judgment after all.
Love Island U.S has also been considerably more unsuccessful than its U.K counterpart, with all the couples splitting up since it began airing in 2019.
It’s no secret that Love Island is one of the most influential dating shows around (it’s also pretty successful too according to the stats!) – 15 other versions have been produced all around the world since the U.K version began airing in 2015. The latest season of Love Island U.K was viewed by an average of over 3 million people.
When it comes to Love Island, if you don’t leave with the love of your life, you might still stand to make quite a bit of cash. The winning couple takes home £50,000, but as long as you’ve made a name for yourself on the show – brands will be scrambling to work with you once you’ve stepped outside the villa.
So, which series of Love Island was the most successful?
SlotsUp has ranked each of the six seasons based on three things; how many couples are still together, the average number of Instagram followers amongst the show’s couples, and the average amount they can earn from one post on the grid.
We already know that the latest season, season 6, has seen most of its couples stay together – but 2019’s season 5 still strongly holds the top spot.
Despite only having 1 couple remaining, the contestants of season 5 have an average of over 2 million followers and can earn around £5000 for one single post on Instagram. You can thank Molly-Mae Hague and Tommy Fury for that- not only are they the last couple standing from season 5 – but the two can also rack up around £19,000 between them for one grid post each.
Finally, we uncovered which country has the most successful version of Love Island. SlotsUp crunched the numbers for the U.K, U.S, and Aussie editions, and no surprise, Love Island U.K still came out on top.
Love Island Australia, which has become well known for its explosive arguments and resident villa cat, secured second place with an 8.33% success rate – 1 out of 12 couples still together isn’t too bad we suppose, much better than the U.S’ big, fat 0, anyway.
Methodology
We scoured each shows’** dedicated Wikipedia pages to find out how many couples it had produced, and how many are still together as of March 2021 (we also cross-referenced this with Instagram accounts of the contestants and the most up-to-date articles reporting on their relationship status)
To find out the most successful Love Island series we looked at the Instagram followings and used an online tool to estimate the earnings of every contestant that left in a couple.
For Naked Attraction and First Dates, we had to use a slightly different methodology as data for every single contestant wasn’t readily available. We worked out how many dates there were on average based on knowledge of the show, and how many episodes have aired, followed by in-depth research of news articles reporting on which couples were still together.
Sources
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page
https://loveisland.fandom.com/wiki/Love_Island_Wiki
https://influencermarketinghub.com/instagram-money-calculator/
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