80 Unhinged Screenshots That Are A Symbol Of Online Dating (New Pics)

Not every bio or conversation on Tinder is a winner, but you have to be realistic and can’t expect every interaction on a dating app to be positive — that would be statistically improbable. We think this list is a good reflection of what you might find on Tinder — a little bit of humor, a little bit of disappointment, and a solid dose of WTF moments in between.

So, what works best on Tinder? When it comes to words, it’s humor. One experiment by behavioral scientists showed that humorous conversation starters and replies yielded more matches than earnest ones. When participants used funny one-liners and jokes, their odds of getting a match increased by 12%.

Since men tend to get less than half as many matches and replies on dating apps as women, the researchers focused on sending messages from hypothetical men’s profiles. They sent out a total of 1,227 messages to 1,227 unique Tinder profiles — from straight men to straight women — and observed how differently women responded given the nature of the message.

The default “funny” sentence they used wasn’t even particularly complex: “Hey, did we have class together? I could have sworn we had chemistry.” The competing “earnest” sentence was “Hey, what song have you been playing on repeat lately?” Perhaps even the slightest attempt at humor is what piques a woman’s interest — they might value a good sense of humor more than good looks.

It wouldn’t be fair to assume that all kinds of humor are appreciated on dating apps. Another Tinder study found that women like funny men, but don’t appreciate jokes that are objectifying or in any way comment on their appearance. For example, the joke “Are you from Tennessee? Because you’re the only 10 I see,” while combining humor and a compliment, did not do well.

“For a successful dating experience, do not use ‘cheesy’ or ‘cliché’ pick-up lines,” co-author of the study, assistant professor at Kennesaw State University, Minhao Dai told PsyPost. “Simple humor or a simple compliment works well. However, when you cramp too much into one pick-up line, Tinder daters, especially female users, found it off-putting.”

If you’re looking for ways to increase your dating app matches, there’s one thing that’s almost guaranteed to bring them down — a pic of you holding a fish. The infamous “fish pics,” where men are holding their unalived catch, are such a meme at this point that Tinder even ran a humorous April Fools’ campaign promising to ban all fish pics: “The app is expected to be fish-free in 24 hours,” they joked.

Instead of fish pics, dogs work way better. A survey by the online dog walking and sitting marketplace Rover found that 60% of pet lovers would swipe right if they came across a profile with pics of an owner with their dog. Philip Tedeschi, professor and researcher on the human-animal bond, says that people feel more comfortable and attracted to someone who demonstrates a loving bond with their pet.

What are your tips about being on dating apps, Pandas? What sort of openers do you usually go for, and is humor what you’re looking for in a potential date? Let us know your strategies and share your Tinder success and horror stories with us in the comments!

And if you’re craving some dating app disasters, check out our previous publication about horrible men who had women swearing off dating apps and these “nice girls” who got called out for their delusional behavior.