7 Cups

I have been involved with 7Cups since 2014. I have grown a lot as a person in my service there. There is a clear expectation created in the training and by reminder prompts that it is important, above all else, to keep yourself safe. I am giving 7Cups 3-stars (as of April 2021) for the following reasons--because they decrease my rating from 5-stars:

1. The site can be slow loading chats from the chat menu and can have issues with the scrolling features within a chat. Across various browsers (Chrome, Safari, Firefox) and platforms (MacOS, WindowsOS, iOS) scrolling up and down a chat often lags, is unresponsive, or scrolls seemingly at random. This has been an issue for at least the last year or so.
2. Most guests and members that I have chatted with seek advice. People need somewhere to go to find advice because the listeners are not qualified/authorized to give advice. The self-help guides are not easily accessible anymore, and guests and listeners are not shown them at on-boarding of a new account. Because of this, guests and members easily fill like they aren't having their needs met. The long-distance and anonymous nature of the 7Cups platform poses a challenge to developing emotional connections between people as it is. Not providing an easily available bank of advice links to share to guests magnifies this problem. Listeners need to meet the guests where their needs are. Listeners need a side bar with advice links or support options to share/use during the chat.
3.7Cups has been used by people who directly seek chats that are primarily sexually gratifying. While there is a clear level of complexity to the potential rules regarding that, I wouldn't want my children seeking help on 7Cups as it currently stands until they are well over 18 yrs old. Human beings are sexual creatures. There needs to be some effort (whether explicitly or using principles of applied social psych) to channel sexual traffic on the site in a more positive way. Usernames have been very frequently customized to be sexual innuendos.

These 3 things are heavy negatives, but there is still meaning created on 7Cups for many people. I hope that 7Cups continues to improve and generate better mental health worldwide.

I'm only giving it 3 stars because I know there are people there with good intentions.

As a listener: 7cups really doesn't want you to act like one. Telling you to respond with 'I understand' and to summerize what the other one is saying. I followed the 7cups rules at first, but I'm beyond that now. I get where they are coming from: giving advice can be harmful. But it's also human to do so. Why would I respond to a person who is in distress with something like 'mhmm' (as they suggest)? If I was the one talking and someone would give me a 'mhmm' I'd be anxious as hell and feeling like I'm just a bother. If you follow most of the guidelines 7cup has prepared for you, you will look more of a robot showing zero empathy and you'll end up doing more harm than good. Please follow you're instincts when talking to someone and show them kindness. That's really all you have to do. Also, the amount of guys thinking listeners are there to hear out their sex talk is really high. It pisses me off whenever I get one of those people but you can't straight up ban them, because 7cups will ban YOU for getting rid of them.

As a member: I was shocked to try the site from another perspective. Was having an anxiety attack and just wanted someone to talk me through it. I got matched up with people who all say they have personal experience with anxiety and have a 5 star rating as well, but didn't understand at all and ended up making me feel even worse. How are these people still a thing? How do they have such a high rating?

Overall I know there are listeners out there who will try to help you. After all, that's why I joined. But 7cups doesn't offer a reliable system to filter out who is actually good and who isn't. So please, stay safe <3

This website is perfect for people that aren't feeling very well and also pefect for people that wan to help the people in trouble.

With this site you can give encouraging words to those who might need it, or be the one who needs it AND I LOVE THAT

At first glance, this site seems excellent. It is primarily free of charge, and you are almost always guaranteed to find someone who can listen to whatever issues you'd like to share. They also have a rewarding level system for Listeners which I reckon would look good on a CV for certain jobs.

However, there are a few issues. First and foremost would be the abuse of the reporting system and how easy the site allows for this to happen. Clearly, whoever gives the final decision on which users to ban does not look at any evidence of the supposed crime before issuing an immediate ban. Countless times I've had people report me just out of malice, we disagree over something, or a member was in a bad mood so decides to report me or other Listeners which of course results in an immediate ban. In one instance where I believe an angry (but angry over issues unrelated to me) member reported me for "sexual chat" I had to send three long appeals to get my Listener account back. And when you've spent ages building up your Listener level, it's quite a blow to log in to find yourself banned. And like with a lot of too big for their shoes online companies that don't see the effects of their attitude, they don't even bother to justify their ban.

The second issue would be how tight the restrictions are on conversations are and how sensitive, and I'd go as far as saying stupid, members take advantage of them. Understandably, members on there are primarily vulnerable people wanting to discuss their mental health issues, abusive situations. But when the site demands you have no sort of meaningful conversation whatsoever to not "trigger" people" (politics, religion, science and what not) you get narrow minded members who will not properly engage in conversations, and when they disagree with someone they will actually act quite rude towards someone stating a peaceful opinion but because they act "triggered" the moderators will take their side.

To summarise, it could be a great place, but 7cups' own restrictive rules and the ease in which these rules and the banning system can be abused taint the site. Certainly use it to have a 1 on 1 chat, you may get a nice chat, but at the same time, dare to disagree with someone (which you should do in an open minded, safe and intelligent place) and you risk being permanently banned without reason or warning.

As a member of this site, you have to realize that this is not a substitute for therapy. It is a site that allows a human to interact with another human over the internet. Both are strangers, and for some reason I felt like I could "bare my soul" and not worry about judgment. The listeners are mostly very supportive and do what they are supposed to do - "listen." Every once in a while you run into someone who wants to throw a bunch of non-helpful cliches in your general direction, which isn't helpful. These people are definitely not therapists, so if you're looking for solid advice, that's not what the site is for, and it's clear. It's a way to get stuff that's rolling around inside your head out there and discussed. I can talk about things that are bothering me, and somehow I feel lighter after having typed them into the interwebs. I appreciate the volunteers out there willing to listen to me whine and complain, and they at least seem like they don't mind! For me, that's awesome. And my husband doesn't have to listen to any of it, which is awesome for him.

I read a couple other reviews on this site that say they think the site is all about profit, but I don't feel pressured into paying for the therapy services advertised. I will say that I don't find a lot of value in the group chat rooms. Seems like those who moderate in those rooms should have some sort of guided topics or something, so that there is relevant discussion in the rooms when you visit. Every time I've gone in those chat rooms, it's a string of hello/hi/hey and not much else. I love the question and answer section, where there are multiple responses to questions on topics of interest to me. And some of the forums are fun to join, in that you can "check in" daily or weekly with a question of the week, or something of that nature.

And I'll say it one last time, because it bears repeating - the free features of this site are not meant to be therapy - in any way, shape or form. It is a social site that offers a little relief when you need someone to hear what you have to say in that moment. If you really think about it, there are very few free sites that allow interaction between two humans. In a world where there are so many people alone, let's try to be positive about a website that is offering that option to those who really do need that kind of venue.

Thank you guy's for helping me and other people it means a lot to me and others keep helping us!

I've been a user of 7 Cups for 5 years. Both as member and listener. The platform was great until 2016-2017 when they have made changes due to that, some great people left.
7 Cups is free and anyone can use it but it also attracts trolls and abusers, 7 Cups doesn't do enough efforts to stop them apart from intuitives for volunteers to help them with that issue. It's easy for anyone to make accounts, can be members or listeners accounts, and start abusing vulnerable members.
The platform is operated by multiple teams Tech, community etc. The community has very few members who are paid administrators, but 90% of the work is done by volunteers. The main purpose of all leadership roles ( both administrative paid jobs and voluntary roles) is to maintain the concept of " community". Being apart of support community can be helpful but in long run it's addictive. While many people find it helpful, 7 Cups also find it helpful because that what makes the volunteers make most of the work for 7cups (with enthusiasm and excitement) for free because they believe they are making valuable contributions to a community they belong to. It's anonymous and if you delete your account, all what you have done for the platform is forgotten specifically if you were someone who believes in 7 Cups. Your work remains at 7Cups and they will use it, but none knows who you are. 7 Cups has become as it is now by the efforts of volunteers.
7 Cups certainly uses aggregated data from the chats transcripts to conduct research and studies as stated in 7 Cups privacy policy.
All over those 5 years, there has not been any changes to improve listeners quality which is weird, the only thing that worries 7 Cups owners was making sure more users come to 7cups. For that they launched 7 Cups in many different languages and, of course, those who make the translations are volunteers.
If you want to be a listener and volunteer your time to help someone in need then do it. If you want to take leadership roles on 7Cups, know you're a volunteer and 7 Cups is for-profit organisation. It is not charity.
There are many listeners who sincerely want to help others. If you want to reach out to 7 Cups, do it but be careful.
Unfortunately, 7 Cups is getting worse every day and more good listeners are constantly leaving and many trolls coming. It gets harder to find good listeners.

The interface is really cool and the questioning process is also really awesome. Overall I love it!

Bonjour, je suis une jeune française de 14 ans, il y a deux ans maintenant, j'ai fait une depression, j'ai tentée plusieurs fois de me tuer et j'ai fini par aller un peu mieux l'année dernière, je n'en avais parlée à presque personne exceptée ma psychologue que j'ai fini par arrêter de voir, cependant, je sentais depuis quelques mois déjà que je recommençais à me sentir mal et à penser à des choses mauvaises, j'ai donc décidée de ne pas me laisser faire et de rechercher de l'aide en ligne, mes relations familiales étant très mauvaises, j'ai trouvée une "pub" sur pinterest/instagram il me semble et j'ai voulu tenter.
Il était deux heures du matin et j'étais en pleurs sous ma couette.
J'ai parlée à deux personnes, la première, très gentille, à essayée de m'aider mais j'étais gênée et ai fini par inventée une excuse pour quitter la conversation, j'en suis encore désolée et ai quand même mis la note maximale à l'écoutante car elle a quand même su me mettre un sourire sur le visage.
La deuxième personne, était plus directe, j'étais étonnée au début et ne m'y attendais pas, mais au final je crois que c'était ce dont j'avais besoin, j'ai voulu la recontacter par la suite mais je n'ai pas osée.
Me revoici, quelques mois après, me sentant mieux qu'avant et ayant l'impression de guérir.
Merci infiniment 7cups.