Gay sauna reviews: how to interpret the good and the bad

Reading reviews online is thrilling and dispiriting in equal measure. User reviews - especially from those with a “verified purchase” tag on Amazon - have a ring of authenticity. Ah, you think, here’s the real voice of the people and their unfiltered thoughts on all the latest products.

But then it all goes a bit wrong. You think you’ve found the perfect new hairdryer until you begin to doubt all the five-star reviews. Have the manufacturers enlisted a Russian troll farm to flood them with glowing reviews? You then find a one-star review: “Awful. Exploded straight away. Never again.” Did that really happen or are you just reading the musings of a strange and misguided person? Reluctantly, you put off looking for a new hairdryer, unsure of what to believe.

Planning a gay sauna visit via online reviews is no easier. One review will extoll the virtues of a venue’s hygiene policies, and the next review will inform you that it’s the most unhygienic place you will ever visit, and should be closed down. A lot of reviews will point out that the clientele, about four people in towels, are all over sixty. But the next review will rave about a steam room full of pristine twinks. Now you’re on the horns of a dilemma: Schrödinger's sauna. Can it be both the worst and best place you’ll ever visit, simultaneously?

How to interpret gay sauna reviews

People will leave bad reviews if they have bad experiences, but bad experiences can be subjective. If the experience was bad because the reviewer didn’t get laid, it’s hardly the fault of the sauna. Sometimes sauna reviewers will refer to sauna attendees as having a lot of “attitude” which actually translates as “they didn’t want to sleep with me.”

What about good reviews? 

Some people, for reasons of public service, like to review their gay sauna experiences: many do it on Travel Gay. The good reviews can involve quite detailed descriptions of exactly what happened, how many times, and with whom. Some of the sauna reviews we receive are so vividly descriptive, that we’ve considered submitting them to Penguin Random House.

Red flags to look out for

If a reviewer begins by describing how brilliant the manager is and clearly in need of a raise, you’re probably reading a review written by the manager. Real people don’t tend to wax lyrical about managers when writing reviews.

Was the sauna empty?

Some saunas are busier than others. Clearly, a sauna located in the centre of London will attract more visitors than a sauna in rural Maine. But even the biggest and busiest saunas will have quieter moments. As most big saunas are open 24-hours a day, you need to plan your visit accordingly. If you attend a sauna at 9:30 am on a Tuesday, it probably won’t be busy. If, however, you attend at around midnight on a Friday, it will be filling up with gay migrating from the bars. If someone is whining about an empty sauna, try to determine when they visited and draw your own conclusions.