I’ve been on Upward less than a day. I’ll come back later to write an updated review. So , far, however, it looks like all of the negative reviews are correct, unfortunately. Upward is full of bots and shady profiles. In less than 24 hours I’ve had three matches. One was obviously a bot, one I haven’t reached out to yet, and one asked me to meet almost immediately (which is fine), but he insisted that I go to his place for the first meeting and unmatched when I suggested a public meeting first. I think that was a real person but I got a very bad vibe out of it, like there may have been something worse going on there that could seriously jeopardize someone’s safety. Be very cautious when using Upward, even more so than you would any of the rest of them. I think I’ve figured out how to spot these fake profiles (their “faith” section is very vague, for one), so we’ll see.
That said, as a Christian/Conservative in a Leftist city, it’s a nightmare trying to find a match on the mainstream dating apps like Bumble, Hinge, etc. I swipe right maybe 1 out of 500 times because most of the people on those apps are the Atheist/Liberal types or they are looking for hookups and polyamory. I’ll try Upward out a little while longer, but am very disappointed. They just need to add a way to verify profiles.