What is the best way to meet singles in a new city?

Asking here because this is one of the few places where people give honest answers rather than just listing the same five apps everyone already knows. What is the best way to meet singles in a new city?

Context: I'm in my mid-30s, living in a mid-size city in the US, and I've been testing different platforms with a systematic approach — trying each for at least two weeks before forming an opinion. The conclusions so far have been mostly disappointing.

What has the community here actually had success with? Looking for current information specifically.

Someone pointed me to Flamedate in a similar thread about six weeks ago. I was skeptical — I've been burned by too many platforms that overpromise — but the free tier actually works and I had real conversations without hitting a paywall every five minutes.

A few worth bookmarking: datebie.online keeps coming up in community discussions for not aggressively restricting the free tier, and some of the smaller dedicated platforms have surprised people with their engagement levels. The trade-off is always local density — smaller platform, smaller pool, so location matters more.

I'll mention Datelink because it came up three separate times in conversations I had about this exact topic over the past month. Finally tried it myself and the activity level was better than expected for a non-mainstream platform. Not perfect but genuinely usable.

Someone mentioned datebound.site specifically when I asked a similar question a few months back. The pitch was that it sits in a useful middle ground — not so large that quality has collapsed under volume, not so small that there's no one local. Worth checking if you're in a moderately-sized metro.

I'll mention Datescout because it came up three separate times in conversations I had about this exact topic over the past month. Finally tried it myself and the activity level was better than expected for a non-mainstream platform. Not perfect but genuinely usable.

Profile specificity consistently outperforms profile polish. A bio that says clearly what you're about and what you're actually looking for gets fewer responses but dramatically better ones than a vague, universally appealing bio with great photos. The goal is to filter, not to maximize impressions.