How big does your city or town need to be for you to be successful with online dating? I get a lot of questions about this. I’m going to give you the most definitive answer I possibly can since every region is different, and it’s all based on my experience working with thousands of men over the past 13 years as big, bad Blackdragon.

Size Does Matter

Here’s the general range in which this works. The town or city within a one-hour radius of your home needs to have at least 400,000 people for online dating to work at least moderately effectively. I’ll be honest: Even 400,000 will be a little tough. You’ll have to work it pretty hard and be a little less picky about how attractive the women are if you’re dating online in a city no bigger than that.

If you live in or near a town smaller than 400,000 people, you have several options, and they’re all bad. One option is to focus your dating life on the weekends and use online dating in the nearest largest city of one to two million people. In that scenario, you would head to that town, get a hotel room, stay all weekend, and do all your dating and sexual stuff over the weekend. Then on Sunday evening or Monday morning, depending on your schedule, you’d drive back home. I think it would be a huge hassle, but some guys do it, and they make it work.

Another option would be using online dating as a supplement to other things, particularly social circle game. Doing night game won’t be an option in a small town. You could do daygame to a degree (COVID-19 notwithstanding). So for guys in small towns, it’s really social circle game with some online dating sprinkled in there. But unless you enjoy some unusual circumstances, like living in a resort town that sees a large influx of women during certain times of the year, online dating probably won’t get it done for you.

Bright Lights, Big City

If your city has one million people or more, online dating will work much better than in cities of only 400,000, but it could still be a challenge. You’ll have to work hard and be very patient. You’ll have to put in a lot of numbers, be on a lot of apps, and maybe drop your hotness standards in terms of the women you’ll accept. But there are guys in these cities who are making online dating work and they’re doing just fine. Many of them are contributors to The Ultimate Online Dating Manual.

The Sweet Spot

Cities of two million or more fall into this category. Anything at two million or higher, you’re good to go. If you’re in a metro area with more than two million, you’ll be even better off. The nearest city where I live is Portland, Oregon; that’s about 2.2 million in terms of the entire geographic area, and that’s an important distinction: I’m talking about the greater metro area of the city in question, not just the city proper. So don’t go looking up cities’ populations on Wikipedia; you’ll only get the actual city numbers. You want the entire metro area. That’s the number you’ll actually be dealing with when it comes to online dating.

Where You Live

If you live in the city core or downtown area, online dating is going to be very easy for you. The logistics will be fantastic. The problem is that you’ll be spending more money. As with many other things, this turns out to be a balancing act between your woman life and your financial life. Do you want to live somewhere really cheap but have a tougher dating life, or would you rather live somewhere more expensive and have a fucking amazing time doing night game, daygame, and online dating? It really depends on you. Both options have their advantages and disadvantages.

In general, younger guys are going to tend to live closer to the city core; older guys tend to live farther out. In my case, the older I’ve gotten, the farther away from the cities I’ve gone, which makes sense; you’re not going to want to party and shit all the time in the cities when you’re fifty. Living farther away from the city core, of course, means more complicated logistics for online dating since you have to travel farther to meet up with people. You have to be more strategic in planning first dates.

One last thing, and I’m a broken record about this: If you live in a small town (smaller than 400,000) and it sucks because you can’t get laid and can’t date—FUCKING MOVE! Don’t give me this bullshit about how you can’t move. I didn’t tell you to move tomorrow; I just said move. If you need to plan on moving in the next 6-12 months, make the plan and then get it done. If it’s worth it to you to move closer to a bigger city for the dating options, then do it. Don’t sit out in the middle of nowhere and bitch and moan that you can’t get laid because there are no women.

Let me add one thing to that. The Western world is collapsing, especially the United States and Europe, so we’re entering into an era in which you may not want to live in a big city. There’s a much higher possibility for civil unrest and violence. Americans, in particular, have to get used to the idea of things like this happening pretty constantly. But in terms of your woman life, you may want to live at least close to a city. Just understand these logistics and don’t make excuses about them. The Alpha Male 2.0 is location independent, so “I can’t move” is not an excuse.

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9 Comments on “How Big Does Your Town Need To Be For Online Dating?

  1. If your city has one million people or more, online dating will work much better than in cities of only 400,000, but it could still be a challenge. You’ll have to work hard and be very patient. You’ll have to put in a lot of numbers, be on a lot of apps, and maybe drop your hotness standards in terms of the women you’ll accept.

    Alternatively just rent some really hot porn stars if you don’t have any emotional problems with P4P and you’re looking for a one-night-stands. Yes it’s expensive, but the time you save allows you to make money thru your business and you get maximal choosing power over which hot women you want to fuck. You either put in the numbers or you put in the dough

    Cities of two million or more fall into this category. Anything at two million or higher, you’re good to go. If you’re in a metro area with more than two million, you’ll be even better off.

    I’m going to make a bold prediction that online dating in big American cities will eventually get as bad as it is in smaller American cities based on the trends of American women becoming increasingly masculine, people leaving big American cities in droves due to the economic/social fallout of COVID, and the increase in civil unrest and imposition of Martial law in said cities.

    In general, younger guys are going to tend to live closer to the city core; older guys tend to live farther out. In my case, the older I’ve gotten, the farther away from the cities I’ve gone, which makes sense; you’re not going to want to party and shit all the time in the cities when you’re fifty.

    I must be an anomaly here. I’m a younger guy who lives in the outer suburbs and hates parties. I find them too noisy and they also tend to be filled with dumb, obnoxious guys trying to pick fights.

    Don’t sit out in the middle of nowhere and bitch and moan that you can’t get laid because there are no women.

    Man I can’t wait for lifelike sex robots to be mainstream. Another benefit they will bring, aside from eradicating women’s sexual power, is that they will allow men to live like kings in the middle of nowhere for dirt cheap and not have to worry about driving hundreds of miles to the nearest city to date women or pay hookers. I’m hoping for that and food delivery by drones.

    The Western world is collapsing, especially the United States and Europe, so we’re entering into an era in which you may not want to live in a big city. There’s a much higher possibility for civil unrest and violence. Americans, in particular, have to get used to the idea of things like this happening pretty constantly.

    Now I’m really glad I did the hooker thing. Since a lot of the ease of online dating is centered around big cities where the hottest women tend to be concentrated, COVID has more or less put a corkscrew into this whole paradigm. That and the whole trends of getting laid becoming increasingly transactional and American women becoming increasingly masculine – well might as well start early.

  2. Alternatively just rent some really hot porn stars if you don’t have any emotional problems with P4P and you’re looking for a one-night-stands. Yes it’s expensive, but the time you save allows you to make money thru your business and you get maximal choosing power over which hot women you want to fuck. You either put in the numbers or you put in the dough

    Perfectly valid for men who meet the 2 criteria here. Otherwise no.

  3. Man I can’t wait for lifelike sex robots to be mainstream.

    Realistic feel and look sex robots that are cheap is never going to happen no matter what people say about technological advancement. The cost of the materials for such realism alone is very high so it cannot be mitigated by economies of scale. That is for actually owning one or a few – that will be only for the very rich – but for the plebs there might be subscription packages and rental but it won’t be cheap. There already is a sex doll brothel in a few places.

  4. Smaller cities with much lower populations sometimes work very well if they have disproportionate numbers of young women in constant influx. This is true for many university towns. Often such women also struggle with money and dont have time for paid work (due to study) so you can sugar date them often quite cheaply because they have no idea how much to charge / don’t need that much and just wanna cover the expenses.

    To me this is the golden ratio between cost of living, not have to worry about nasty consequences of big cities and sufficient access to (young) women. Ideally such a uni town should be located not so far from other bigger cities and or international airport and you’re settled.

  5. This was one of the main reasons why I moved. I lived in a city of about 200.000 inhabitants with 3 cities of about 100.000 inhabitants within a radius of 1 hour traveling time.

    With online dating I met the occasional cute girl, but for the most part it was a tsunami of single mothers and women with the ‘Karen’ haircut (or as we here call it: the ‘I don’t mind I look just like my 50 year old brother’ look).

    Now I live in a city of 150.000 inhabitants 10 minutes away from a city of 350.000 people, 30 minutes away from a city of 900.000, a city of 600.000, another one of 400.000. And several smaller ones. All within a radius of 30 minutes.

    Both the quality and quantity of women I meet online, through several different dating apps, have improved immensely.

  6. Realistic feel and look sex robots that are cheap is never going to happen no matter what people say about technological advancement. The cost of the materials for such realism alone is very high so it cannot be mitigated by economies of scale.

    New materials, smarter parts design, and new, cheaper manufacturing methods for existing materials will fix that. As an example, go watch Tesla’s battery day presentation on their new 4680 cell. They managed to reduce the kWh cost of a electric vehicle battery by 56% mainly by swapping expensive materials for cheaper ones, simplifying the design of the cell, and optimizing existing manufacturing processes. This same pattern has repeated itself in previous hot industries and will repeat itself in the fledgling robotics industry. Sex robots will be a HOT market (especially in the Western world with its women growing increasingly masculine, picky, and dominant) within the next decade or two. Large sex robot companies with the capital to invest in improved manufacturing and materials will do it in order to make cheaper, better looking sex robots and turn in billions of dollars in profit. They know that sex sells and want to cash in on it. What I’m saying might sound like crazy talk today, but it will be a reality within a decade or two.

    Perfectly valid for men who meet the 2 criteria here. Otherwise no.

    I completely agree with the financial criteria. The bare minimum a man needs to do is learn to make decent money and manage his money well, otherwise he will little to no options as to where he lives, what he eats, what he has, etc. There is really no way to avoid that at least until everything becomes automated, it MUST be done.

    The second criteria I sort of disagree with. I remember reading a post on your old sublimeyourtime blog that people become successful because they stick to one specific task. In my mind, this conflicts with the idea that to be Alpha 2.0 you have to BOTH make $75k/yr location-independent and be able to get laid with 2 new women in a 4 week period w/o paying for it. Both of those tasks require playing an intensive number game. Why try to play two intense number games, when I can play one, get so good at it that I surpass 99% of men, and can then use my money to free me of having to play the other one? Also, why limit myself to just “cute” women when I can jump straight to the perfect 10s?

    I do think men should be aware of how women and the PUA process work (which you can do by reading sites like this, girlschase, and watching PUA YouTube videos; lots of content on the internet). That said, I believe that the individual man should decide whether he wants to bother applying PUA to get laid or just making enough money to afford paying for it based on his personality and lifestyle objectives.

    From my experience, I’ve had a hot young hooker ask me to hang out after we fucked (I literally just wanted to go home). I took her to a club and we banged the night after. The majority of men have never had that happen to them. So you can still have positive women experiences with hookers that can boost your self esteem and ego.

  7. What I’m saying might sound like crazy talk today, but it will be a reality within a decade or two.

    Replacing materials inside a product like battery cell is not the same as lifelike polymers on the outside. That stuff is very expensive. Of course a lot can change with technology but not within the timescale you say I think. On the other hand there might be reasonably realistic models for the price of a car, which a lot of guys might buy, or more likely its gonna be the rental scheme I mentioned.

    My fav part about all this is that women say they are not worried about this because who would want the kind of guys that would get the robots anyway…. yeah well lets see what happens when those kinds of guys stop showering them with attention. Its already happening in Japan, there they dont need robots, virtual characters have already started to replace women.

  8. Realistic feel and look sex robots that are cheap is never going to happen no matter what people say about technological advancement.

    Incorrect, but off-topic, so I’ll leave it at that (and call it “realistic enough” instead of “realistic”).

    This was one of the main reasons why I moved.

    Well done. Taking action instead of just sitting around and bitching. Outstanding.

    I remember reading a post on your old sublimeyourtime blog that people become successful because they stick to one specific task. In my mind, this conflicts with the idea that to be Alpha 2.0 you have to BOTH make $75k/yr location-independent and be able to get laid with 2 new women in a 4 week period w/o paying for it.

    Maintaining $75K/year and 2-3 women on rotation is not an imporovment area or anything new in your life, therefore it doesn’t count towards the Rule of Two. The Rule of Two is about new goals or new projects only.

    Both of those tasks require playing an intensive number game.

    To get there when you’ve never been there, yes. To maintain it once you have not, no, not at all.

    I do think men should be aware of how women and the PUA process work (which you can do by reading sites like this, girlschase, and watching PUA YouTube videos; lots of content on the internet). That said, I believe that the individual man should decide whether he wants to bother applying PUA to get laid or just making enough money to afford paying for it based on his personality and lifestyle objectives.

    Read Argument #2 and #6 here. (And while you’re at it, read the rest of that article too.)

  9. I can agree with these numbers. I live in a city of 225 000 people and this sub region within ~45mins drive has about 360k people (but because of sufficient rotation and I’m lazy so I don’t date girls outside the city so 225k population is the number I’m dealing with). Online dating here is painful. I have also pretty much burned out the night life here as well in 3 years of night gaming. Also since I’ve getting quite good success, the standards for the girl have really gone up. In city of this size there just isn’t too many hot girls walking around (online, NG, DG, whatever).

    On the other hand when I visit our capital which has 1,4 million people in the metropolitan area, I could only date from tinder if I wanted. In my current location I can use tinder only as supplement and covid19 era has been awful for sourcing new girls because tinder is almost the only option. In our capital it’s ridiculously easy to make tinder work. Usually if I visit the city over weekend (summer vacation etc) I’m able to arrange ~2 dates adhoc for the weekend with quite attractive girls and they tend to be really into me because most guys in our capital seem to be feminine hipsters and girls are starving to get a more traditional masculine man. In my own city I manage to close dates with hot girls maybe once per 6 months (because I’ve swiped tinder through a long time ago – it usually takes about 2 days to do that with a new profile).

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