Reality TV News
The ‘Farmer Wants a Wife’ franchise has resulted in 226 marriages, according to Fox.
Forget Love Is Blind and The Bachelor. If you really want to find love on a dating show, your best bet might be Farmer Wants a Wife. The global TV franchise claims to have produced hundreds of happy couples – more than any other reality series.
‘Farmer Wants a Wife’ has resulted in more than 200 marriages
Season 3 of Farmer Wants a Wife is currently airing on Fox in the U.S. While the show is relatively new to American audiences, the idea behind it is decades old. The first version of Farmer Wants a Wife premiered in the U.K. in 2001. The concept – which involves a group of farmers selecting a partner from a group of women from the city – has proven incredibly popular around the world, with versions airing in 34 countries, including Austria, Ireland, Belgium, South Africa, and Canada. (An earlier American version aired on The CW in 2008.)
Given the sheer number of series and participants, it’s not a huge surprise that Farmer Wants a Wife touts itself as the world’s most successful dating show. According to Fox, the franchise has resulted in 226 marriages and 565 children (with another four on the way).
‘Farmer Wants a Wife’ isn’t the most successful American dating show
Farmer Wants a Wife seems to be doing something right when it comes to making matches. But how successful is the U.S. version of the show compared to other relationship-focused reality shows?
The 2008 take on Farmer Wants a Wife was a dud. It featured one farmer and didn’t lead to a lasting relationship. Things seemed to improve with the 2023 reboot, which resulted in three of the four farmers choosing one lucky lady to join them on their farm. But all three couples broke up not long after the finale aired.
Farmer Wants a Wife Season 2 was more successful. While one farmer opted to remain single and another’s relationship ended before the reunion, two couples are still together (but not married) a year later: Sydney and Mitchell and Nathan and Taylor. That’s two successful matches out of the nine farmers who’ve participated so far, a 22% success rate.
How does that compare to other dating shows? Reality TV juggernaut The Bachelor has managed to produce just six couples (and three marriages) over 29 seasons, though that includes a couple of Bachelors who ended up with their runner-up. Sister show The Bachelorette has produced four couples over 21 seasons. That’s 10 lasting relationships over 50 seasons, or a 20% success rate.
Love Is Blind hasn’t been around as long, but it has a better track record, with 11 couples still together out of 44 engagements featured on the show — a 25% success rate. Another popular dating show, Married at First Sight, has a 16% success rate, with 12 out of 74 matched couples still together.
Farmer Wants a Wife airs Thursdays at 9 p.m. ET on Fox. Episodes stream the next day on Hulu.
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