The latest season of Married at First Sight Australia is well underway on E4 and we are loving getting to know the season ten contestants as the drama starts to unfold.
For those unfamiliar with the show, it sees a batch of singles from Down Under matched with their "perfect partner" by a team of experts before meeting their new spouses for the first time on their wedding day.
While many lucky contestants walk away from the experiment with a life partner, some are forced to go home with their hearts broken. But do they really leave the programme with nothing to show for it? Read on to find out if the contestants are paid...
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Are Married at First Sight contestants paid?
Yes. The contestants who appear on the show do get paid for their participation. While there is no prize for staying married at the end of the series, the contestants do get paid daily. But exactly how much do they get?
Former contestant Nasser Sultan told Now to Love: "You get $150 for the day, that's it. But on top of that, you have to pay expenses - your living expenses with the woman that you marry."
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"It's not $150 clear. You still have to pay rent if you're renting, you've gotta pay your rego and it's 12 hour filming days."
© Photo: Channel 4Couples get paid daily for participating in the show
According to Nasser, who was partnered with Gabrielle Bartlett on a previous season of the show, the MAFS contract states that the contestants "get a per diem" which means they are not being "paid for work" but are given a daily allowance to cover expenses.
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"None of our groceries were covered," he explained. "They filmed us going shopping and we had to shop at the same grocery store - which was really expensive, but it was out of our own money."
"Gab and I would sometimes spend up to $70 a day on just living, so we didn't have much left after that," he added.
© Photo: Channel 4Couples don't get paid for staying married at the end of the experiment
Another former contestant, Mikey Pembroke, who appeared in the 2020 series, previously claimed that those who appear on the show "don't get paid at all".
Speaking on the I've Got News For You podcast, Mikey revealed that he walked away with "about 1,000 bucks" from the show. "You don't get paid at all – this is a thing that needs to change," he said.
"But the show makes an incredible amount of money. And say you were on, you know, a TV show that does really well, the actors get paid more and more because it's doing so well. And that's the way it should be for MAFS," he explained.
Married at First Sight Australia is available to stream on All4.
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