Married at First Sight has a very poor success rate matching successful couples, and the blame lies on production and the experts. Married at First Sight season 17 in Denver finished airing in late April 2024, and it was a failure in many ways. Orion Martzloff asked Lauren Goodger for a divorce upon returning from their disastrous honeymoon, making them the first couple of the season to split. However, before that, participant Michael Shiakallis was matched with a mystery bride who ditched him at the altar, so there were two bad matches early on.
Next, Clare Kerr and Cameron Frazer broke up on their one-month anniversary. Brennan Shoykhet and Emily Balch officially gave up a few days before Decision Day, and Michael and his second match, Chloe Brown, broke up on Decision Day after Chloe said yes and Michael said no. Becca Haley and Austin Reed were the only season 17 couple to say yes to each other on Decision Day, but they broke up the next day. There were several causes for the failure of all the couples in season 17 and the failed couples in seasons past, and it’s clear production and the experts are doing something wrong.
In the 17 seasons there has been of Married at First Sight, 64 couples have been matched. Of those couples, only 12 are still together, making the success rate only 18.75%. There are many couples who have said yes to each other on Decision Day only to break up before the Reunion or in the years following their season. In Married at First Sight season 14 in Boston, all five couples said yes to each other on Decision Day, and only Katina Goode and Olajuwon Dickerson are still together, but they’ve broken up at least twice.
The experts have not been able to prevent the couples from breaking up or encouraged them effectively to keep trying, as was the case with Lauren and Orion (via Lifetime.) The low success rate of Married at First Sight is something that can be improved upon, but changes need to be made. In the show’s defense, the couples that have been matched well and that are still together are in very healthy-looking marriages where the pair seem to have been made for each other.
Each season, Married at First Sight goes to different cities and matches people from the dating pool there, however, that is not always done organically. At the beginning of the season, the experts sit down together and remark about how many applicants they have. In season 17’s case, it was 1,000. It has come to light that not many people from the applications are chosen to take part in the experience and that many cast members have actually been recruited. As far back as season 1, Anthony D’amico was recruited off of Tinder.
Many of the male cast members over the seasons have been confirmed to have been recruited, including Michael Shiakallis from season 17.
The production team should do more advertising or employ other methods to ensure that more people apply for the show so they avoid recruiting people because it’s clear that they’ve been picking the wrong participants.
In season 17, production clearly stepped over the line in Becca and Austin’s relationship so much so that it was the catalyst to their breakup. Becca and Austin said yes to each other on Decision Day despite having a rocky marriage. That night, Austin went out with his cast mate Brennan and a female member of their production team. When confronted about the hangout the next day, Austin lied but immediately got caught lying about hanging out with the producer. Becca then broke with Austin in front of the whole Married at First Sight season 17 cast.
Production clearly meddled in Becca and Austin’s relationship, which was extremely inappropriate. Season 17’s Michael also showed off how close he and Chloe were to their production crew in an Instagram post. The production and filming team should not be fostering relationships with the cast members because situations like what happened with Becca and Austin could happen. There is no telling how many times in the past production got too close to the cast and caused issues, but going forward production needs to back off to help the success rate.
The experts have showcased their inability to use good judgment and reasoning to match successful couples.
A large part of the MAFS failure rate can be attributed to the experts’ poor matchmaking. Since the same three experts will be the therapists in Married at First Sight season 18, hopefully, they learned from their past failures so better pairings could be made.
Another reason the Married at First Sight success rate has been so poor is because the experts have dropped the ball in their guidance of the couples. The experts are supposed to identify the issues in each marriage and help each couple overcome their struggles accordingly, but they have not been good at that. They either stepped in when couples’ problems were insurmountable, or they’ve not given the right advice or handled the different personalities at play well.
The experts’ ineffectiveness has been detrimental to the show’s outcome each season. Between the experts and production’s shortcomings, Married at First Sight has not seen much success in matching long-lasting couples. With Married at First Sight season 18 on the horizon, there is a lot of anticipation over whether production and the experts can get it right after so many failures.
Source: Lifetime/YouTube, Michael Shiakallis/Instagram