Key Points
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A “sugar momma” is a woman who financially supports a (usually) much younger partner called a “sugar baby.”
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You can use free platforms like Reddit or Instagram, but the best sugar momma dating apps are ones with a subscription model.
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Sugar momma dating apps with payment tiers, solid safety features, and detailed profile options offer the best selection of potential dates.
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Monthly memberships to the top sugar momma or sugar baby apps start as low as $29.99, though some go up to $44+.
Urban Dictionary defines a sugar momma as “an older woman who can provide an interested male with financial support.” But as any modern woman knows, it’s deeper than that. Rachel Uchitel, a spokesperson for the app Seeking, describes the sugar momma relationship like this: “There are women who have been successful in their career, who know what they want, and money is not an issue for them, so they’re generous when it comes to supporting their partners.” Uchitel says this quid pro quo style of relationship is actually an important flipping of the gender norm that says women should be supported by men. And to really disrupt the binary, there’s no reason that a sugar baby x sugar momma relationship can’t involve the LGBTQ+ community. It’s 2023: There’s plenty of empowering sugar to go around!
You get the companionship you want while sticking it to the patriarchy? It’s a win/win! And the best sugar momma dating apps allow you the chance to try this lifestyle for yourself.
Can You Be a Sugar Momma or Baby on a Totally Free App?
Yes and no. Hashtags like #Sugarmommadating, #Sugarmommaseeking, and #Lookingforasugarmomma have over 9,000 posts on Instagram, but it’s hard to determine just by looking at them which ones are legit. There are also subreddits dedicated to this kind of dating like r/SugarMomma, r/Sugarlifestyleforum, and others. These places seem more suited to answering questions than finding a mate. In general, free platforms offer little in the way of verification and protection, so your chances of finding the relationship you want on there are slim to none.
Relationship therapist Jamie Bronstein claims that “When people are more seriously invested in a dating service, there’s a better chance that matches with long-lasting potential will be made.”
In sexier terms, it’s a great idea to put your money where your mouth wants to be!
Whether you’re a sugar momma looking to lavish attention or a sugar baby ready to get pampered, your best option is to hit the apps.
Top 4 Apps With the Best Reviews and Features
You’re caught up on the nature of sugar-filled relationships, so it’s time to check out some of the best sugar momma dating apps out there. All of them are designed to fulfill your cougar/cub fantasy.
Seeking
There are 500,000 sugar mommas seeking partners on Seeking. That’s roughly seven SoFi stadiums worth of women. Your dating pool on Seeking is basically the equivalent of a week of Taylor Swift concerts – not a bad way to enter your “Lover” era!
Formerly known as Seeking Arrangements, this app claims to help its over 40 million members find “real and honest relationships that fit their lifestyle.” According to a Seeking report from 2022, its members have a collective net worth of 3.5 trillion dollars, meaning that the “lifestyle” they mentioned is probably a pretty ritzy one.
Like many apps, Seeking is free to join but has features like unlimited texting and likes that can only be accessed in their higher-up membership tiers. Still, a 30-day premium subscription starts at only $20, making it an economical way to dip your toe into the high-end side of the sugar momma x sugar baby world.
They also give users access to features that help them showcase their personalities. One such feature is Vibes: a way to share a video snapshot of your day-to-day life. Think of it as the Seeking equivalent of an Instagram story. This means you can put a lot more information out there in interesting ways to attract exactly the kind of relationship you want.
A recent post on the Seekings blog says, “Unlike other dating sites, our members don’t endlessly message back and forth before meeting […] they’re (here) to make new connections, not a pen pal.” According to them, their goal is to take the conversations into the real world, so they put a premium on direct communication and make sure their members feel safe when meeting IRL.
To that end, Seeking attempts to mitigate the risk of catfishing by encouraging their members to get ID verified and they even offer free verification during Fraud Awareness Week. As a result, over 1.4 million of their users were verified in 2022.
Another safety feature provided by Seeking is URSAFE, an app that helps people meeting in person to do everything from schedule a fake call to bail them out of an awkward date, update friends and family on their location, and even push a discreet panic button that shares your location with emergency services. This combined with tabs on their site that provide best practice tips and even information about reporting human trafficking, makes it seem like Seeking takes online and in-person safety very seriously.
Cougar Life
The users of this dating app are so powerful they almost influenced an MLB All-Star Game. In 2013, the marketing team for the New York Mets reached out to Cougar Life to feature third baseman David Wright as the “hottest cub.”
For the uninitiated, a cougar is an older woman who dates significantly younger partners or “cubs.”
The Mets thought that showing Wright to this specific audience would be enough to encourage them to vote for him to play in an All-Star Game. While he did get a ton of hits on Cougar Life, ultimately he didn’t make it to the field. Still, any app with over seven million users and an MLB vote of confidence is worth checking out.
Once you set up a profile you can search for potential partners based on shared interests, geographic location, and availability. Cougar Life even has a “Discover a Date Tonight” feature which shows you all the currently active users ready to take the relationship offline ASAP. As such, this app has a more explicitly mature bend to it.
In short, the cougars are ready to pounce!
Cougar Life also has an in-app currency called Cougar Credits which you can get by more thoroughly filling out your profile. According to their FAQ section, you need seven credits as a cub to initiate contact via message, 12 to make your message take priority in a cougar’s inbox, and five to open and collect new messages. While this sounds silly from the outside (in the realm of tweens on Tik Tok trading “doubloons”), this system ensures people put time and effort into their profiles and can help stop scammers or bots from taking over.
With a free membership, you can upload pictures, search for a match, and send invites to chat. However, you have to upgrade to the premium membership if you want to exchange messages or gifts. It’s $40 for one month, $29 for three months, and only $12 a month for a whole year.
EliteMeetsBeauty
Formerly known as RichMeetBeautiful, EliteMeetsBeauty definitely places a premium on wealth. Though this website also holds space for sugar daddies, 75% of its audience is female so there’s definitely a place for momma to get hers!
The site’s slogan is “don’t date average, date elite!” This website seeks to help you “fill that happiness gap in your life” by introducing you to “other people who share similar beauty, education, or success.” They even go so far as to say that of their 15,000+ members, 85% of them are highly educated. The dating pool is smaller compared to the previously mentioned apps, but it certainly seems to be full of big fish.
It’s free to register and, like most of the other sites mentioned, you don’t have to spend money to make a profile and browse fellow users. Premium membership gives you the ability to send messages and also access to the “Stay Invisible” tool. This feature makes your profile visible only to people who you have already liked, meaning you can browse other profiles anonymously without fielding messages from randos. You can also use anonymity filters to block certain pictures so only your favorite matches get full access to your profile.
There’s even a message filter that allows you to search your inbox for specific keywords so that you only interact with people who are giving you exactly what you want. Unfortunately, this feature isn’t available for IRL conversations!
Privacy and data security are also top priorities for EliteMeetsBeauty, and they go out of their way to mention their system for profile verification, SSL encryption, and fraud detection. They take this a step further by making it easy to block offensive comments and offering 24/7 customer service.
Pricing-wise, EliteMeetsBeauty is comparable to the other sites from this article. Basic membership is $39.99 a month; Premium is $29.99 for three months; Premium Gold is $19.99 for six months; and Premium Platinum is $14.99 for 12 months. All premium tiers get you unlimited chat, the ability to see your likes and views, and the option to request private photos. It appears that the only difference between a Bronze membership and a Platinum one is that you save more money when you buy in bulk.
It’s hard to argue with the Costco model!
Elite Singles
If you want an app that covers all the platforms, Elite Singles is it. They’re owned by the company behind Zoosk, SilverSingles, Jdate, and others. They also feature subsets of dating based on race, age, or religion.
While there isn’t a specific section for sugar relationships, the fact that over 90% of their members are over the age of 30 and have an above-average education suggests that this is a place where powerful women gather. Additionally, this is the first site in this article where the stock images of women actually look older with visible laugh lines and tasteful cardigans.
It’s a spot for the Katherine Keeners rather than just the Sydney Sweeneys.
Elite Singles has 12.5 million users worldwide and claims to facilitate thousands of matches per month. Each of these users undergoes a rigorous personality test that draws on a psychological methodology called “Costa and McCrae’s Five Factor Model.” This test, developed in 1992, claims that everyone has varying degrees of extroversion, neuroticism, openness, agreeability, and conscientiousness.
Researchers feel like these traits tend to have a genetic and cultural basis and tend to stay the same over time, meaning you can get a read of someone’s past and present personality from how much of each trait they possess. All that is to say, the signup process for Elite Singles may take a while, but it’s all in the service of helping you zero in on your exact perfect match.
From there you’ll receive three to seven targeted matches per day. There’s no search filter, but there is something comforting about letting an algorithm do all the work for you. The one downside of these matches is that the search radius is 50 miles, so your sugar partner might be signing up for a bit of a commute.
Elite Singles has only two membership tiers. Basic membership allows you to build a profile and see the kind of matches you would be offered, but you can’t message anyone until you sign up for Premium membership.
Like with every app in this article, Elite Singles wants you to buy several months at a time in their Premium tier. As such, Premium Light costs $44.95 for one month, Premium Classic costs $22.95 per month for three months, and Premium Comfort rings in at $16.96 per month for six months. Still, you can try a Premium membership out for three days before making up your mind. If you aren’t immediately satisfied, you can get a refund within those first three days.
Get Ready To Pounce!
Paid websites are the best way to find the perfect partner for the sugar relationship of your dreams. You’ll meet like-minded people who are also invested in their pleasure, and you’ll probably have a few adventures along the way.
As always, make sure you’re using your chosen site’s safety features and that your red flag detector is extra sensitive. With these apps, you’re one step closer to making 2023 your sweetest year yet.
