Is London’s dating scene actually broken? We asked experts why it feels so hard to find love right now

‘Dating in London is more cut-throat compared to other places,’ says Matt Marshall, 21, who moved to the capital from Brighton eight months ago. 

‘My first date in London was with this guy who didn’t look like his photo.’ Matt considered coming up with a reason to leave early, but it seemed his date had a similar idea. ‘I went to the toilet and when I came back he was gone.’

Matt isn’t the only person with horror stories about looking for love in London. His tale is the kind of experience that many Londoners will be all too familiar with. Situationships, ghosting, creepy love-wanted posters, AI-generated catfish and emotional unavailability are just some of the things singles are all too used to experiencing in 2025. 

In fact, according to census data, more people than ever are single in the Big Smoke. It’s not necessarily unique to London: according to analysis by the Financial Times, we are currently facing a ‘relationship recession’ around the world, leading to rising numbers of singles and falling birth rates globally. In the UK, marriage rates are declining. Recently, research by the thinktank Civitas found that the number of marriages in the UK almost halved over the past 35 years – the company even predicted that marriage could be extinct by 2062. That said, finding a suitable partner in the capital feels especially testing right now.

Less than 37 percent of people were married across all central London boroughs in 2021, according to the census. Lambeth was the borough with the lowest proportion of married adults, with only 25.6 percent of people over 16 married or in a civil partnership. Meanwhile, the national average of people married or in civil partnerships was 47 percent. 

While this sounds pretty extreme, it begs the question – is it really getting harder to find love in the capital? And is the rise in singledom such a bad thing?

The paradox of choice 

‘It may be easier to meet someone in London (and other large cities) simply because of the volume of people available, unlike in rural areas where the pool of people to date will be smaller, making it difficult to find suitable partners,’ says dating coach and psychologist Dr Madeleine Mason Roantree. ‘However, the illusion of choice in London may render singles here less likely to commit, thinking they can always find a better replacement.’

For Matt, the story of feeling like there is too much choice is one that hits close to home. ‘I never get to that stage when it gets serious in London,’ says Matt. ‘Brighton was a lot more friendly. People were more open to just seeing how things go. [In London] it feels like people are at a buffet, and they just don’t know what to pick, so they’ll end up with something that lands right in front of them.’

But as well as London’s seemingly endless pool of potential partners, people’s behaviour has changed in recent years thanks to two different factors: dating apps, and the pandemic. 

‘The pandemic eroded our IRL social muscles,’ says Roantree. Lockdown encouraged us to lean into introverted tendencies, while apps let us do away with straight up human decency. ‘It is easier to ghost and otherwise treat people badly as there are seldom consequences,’ she says. 

Plus, the apps allowed people to become more ‘picky’, and a ‘throwaway mentality crept into dating’. Instead of looking for people who are ‘relationship material’ (good at communicating, willing to commit, kind), daters are focussing on ‘superficial’ qualities, like height, weight and looks. 

‘It is common for people to set their search criteria to an age range younger than themselves, regardless of gender,’ she says. ‘This is a pity because perfectly fine partners are being deselected based on superficial criteria.’

Are Londoners simply too judgemental? My friends and I have a tragic collection of petty reasons why we have been dumped over the years: breathing too much when kissing, using an Americanism instead of the British term, using too much slang over text, being into Gossip Girl, living on the wrong side of the river (we can all relate to that), the list goes on. 

‘While I find London very accepting as a multicultural hub, individually we are less accepting of people who are potential partners,’ Roantree says. And fear of this judgement is causing us to pull away from possible love interests. ‘There is a worry of being too cringe, icky or desperate.’

The cost of being single  

There is no one size fits all answer to why dating in the capital can feel like being in ‘the trenches’. In reality, single Londoners are facing a number of challenges that make dating harder, such as high living costs, demanding work schedules, poor housing, working from home, and a general pressure to feel productive and be your best self all the time. This leads to bad behaviour, with single Londoners having to choke down a cocktail of bad dates, app fatigue, situationships, ghosting, and at worst, prolonged periods of loneliness. 

According to Luke Brunning, an ethics lecturer at Leeds University and co-founder of the Centre for Love, Sex, and Relationships, economic pressures have made it more difficult to meet people in the capital: longer commute times due to living further out, the closure of nighttime venues and general financial worries all have a negative affect on the possibility of finding love. 

‘The dating scene in London is terrible,’ says 30-year-old Frederica, who has been on a romance break since mid-2024. She has been looking for love on and off in London for the past decade, but last year, decided she was officially fed up. ‘I was so done with it. It’s really hard, especially in London,’ she says. ‘Yes, I go on the apps and I try to set up dates, but then I get very frustrated.’

Some might go as far to say that the fabric of London makes it difficult to date or to make finding a partner a priority. ‘If you’re being overworked and underpaid and your housing is terrible, and you're commuting a lot, and you're trying to figure out your way in life and make it in London, which is already really challenging, it can make you a lot less happy-go-lucky,’ says Brunning. ‘It creates a fraught environment.’ 

Frederica thinks many of the single people her age have been priced out of the city. ‘A lot of people at this age are thinking about buying a house, and buying outside of London because it’s cheaper,’ she says. ‘There could be way fewer people than there used to be, or maybe I'm just way pickier than I used to be.’

Hustle mentality

We also can’t forget that many people come to London not looking for love, but with big career or financial aspirations. ‘A lot of people have a dream or a plan,’ says Matt. Often, this plan doesn’t involve finding a partner, but instead revolves around ‘aspirational clout’, which could look like progressing in your dream job, climbing onto the property ladder, or getting in the best shape of your life.  

‘Being in such a fast-paced city when everything is always changing, it’s hard to maintain something unless you are really good at scheduling,’ Matt says.

Unfortunately, this hustle mindset is also reflected in the way we date: Brunning says that the ‘transactional’ and ‘goal-orientated’ nature of dating apps has allowed a ‘businesslike mentality’ to bleed into love and relationships. 

‘There’s a growing idea that we’ve got to be really good at everything,’ says Brunning. ‘You have to be good at communicating, good at sex, good at intimacy, good at work. Plus, we’ve got to stay in shape, and make ourselves attractive, it’s just so exhausting to be good at all of these things.’ Is our fear of rejection turning us into cold-hearted commitment-phobes? Or maybe Londoners just have too much to lose?

‘People in London seem to have an ego and don’t want to get hurt; I think there’s a big problem with hookup culture,’ says Matt. ‘People will tell you things they don’t mean to get what they want.’

Not all hope is lost

The future doesn’t have to be so bleak. Dating apps might make us want to throw our phones in the sea, but a cultural shift is happening, and Londoners are moving away from the apps, and towards in-person events like speed dating, supper clubs and sports groups. 

For younger generations, nothing is more romantic than meeting someone IRL. ‘Gen Z is starting to idealise in-person meetings. We are almost going back to this ’90s ideal of the romantic meet-cute,’ says Brunning. ‘I’ve noticed that my students want something organic, authentic and spontaneous, that’s not mediated by a company [or dating app].’

And this cultural shift could be just the ticket for us to rethink what we actually want from our relationships. For Roantree, it’s an opportunity to assess ‘what commitment looks like, be braver at having those conversations, curb our expectations of others and set better boundaries.’ 

Plus, it’s not all bad. Being single has helped Frederica find ‘strength and courage’. She’s also discovered the pleasure of doing things alone. ‘You can have an amazing time by yourself,’ she says. ‘I went to Mexico a couple of years ago and loved being in a bar by myself.’

Brunning doesn’t think being single is such a terrible thing either. ‘The idea that a good life has a loving romantic relationship at the centre is outdated,’ he says. ‘If people are choosing to be single for the right reasons, or perhaps because they’re valuing other relationships, that’s fantastic. 

‘We're becoming more aware of the diverse forms of connection and intimacy that exist, and I don’t see how that could be a bad thing.’

Additional reporting by Amelia Elder. 

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