My own rule of thumb is 24 hours if no response i tend to remove them as i haven’t got time to waste on people who aren’t serious or who are just looking for a little ego boost
Am i being a bit too ruthless ?
Does anyone ever “Double message” their matches ?
Just feel for me anyone who is taking dating seriously and is interested in you would reply within a day no matter what ….
** EDIT**
Ok judging by comments it seems a lot of people seem to think OLD is less of a priority than ordering a takeaway on uber
I have often wondered what exactly makes OLD / swipe apps such a poor way of meeting the opposite sex
Ultimately it comes down to your priorities we live in an increasingly disposable society and it appears a match on a swipe app is about as disposable as it gets
I think just from the comments people are making you can see very very few take it seriously
It’s not how i roll i get shit done in life …..good luck to some of you lot taking up to 3 weeks to reply to your potential romantic interests 😂
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I give a couple of days. People are busy with work, family, and other activities outside of OLD. They might work long, busy hours during the work week, but might be free to chat on the weekends. They might be traveling for work or having to tend to a family matter. Life happens. If they don’t respond within a week, I usually move on. That tells me they’re not “really” ready to find a relationship.
As for the double messaging, I only do that if i’ve had an ongoing conversation with someone that suddenly stops. They might’ve opened the message and forgot to respond, so I’ll double message within 24-48 hours, but it all depends on how the flow of the conversation goes.
I say give you matches a couple of days minimum. What do you have to lose?
I don’t remove anybody unless it’s a fake account (that got past me), or if they have gone a bit unhinged/off the rails/disrespected a bunch of boundaries — which, even then I’m usually ignoring them and they stop, I’m over it at that point and lose interest, but I would actually remove them if it continued.
Double message – it’s never worked for me based on what I can remember, I never do it anymore. I’ve rematched with people in the future and then we have gone out! However, the matches I tried messaging a second time just went unanswered, it’s a sign that they didn’t have enough interest to respond to the previous one. Which is okay. I agree with you there.
Overall, I wouldn’t fret or worry about it. I’ve had people unmatch me after I didn’t reciprocate something, and all it does is give off a sign of bitterness in my honest opinion. I’d let it go. Don’t reach out again and act like you haven’t matched with them, unless I guess they reach out to you again in the future (which has happened to me before, and they have even asked me out after that!).
Just be patient. I took a while to reply, sometimes 3 days not because I wasn’t interested but because I am busy and work all day so I’m tired after work, plus I have to reply to other matches. If you’re interested in them just ask them out, texting is not a good way to determine whether they are a good match for you. I was definitely taking days to reply to my current boyfriend and he just went ahead and asked me to meet up and I was so happy because texting is a slow process for me.
I feel like that’s ruthless for sure. I have lots of very busy days with work stuff or something else going on where I’m not in the right headspace to have a fun dating chat. Heck, sometimes on the weekends I’ll just give myself a full day, set the phone to silent, and basically not look at it except to check for emergencies.
I think you could miss out on a lot of good dating options with your approach.
The same as I give them to reach out after a first date: 4 days.
Though, like with the scenario after a first date, that’s more of a formality than anything else. If they don’t get back to me within 48 hours, odds are they won’t get back to me at all, and the silence is the message. But I like to give a bit of wiggle room.
For me, four days seems to be the sweet spot where I feel like I’m giving them a fair chance to reach out or respond, but aren’t dismissing them so fast it feels cruel.
I think depends on age, I’m 30s and I give it a few days, most my dates are genuinely busy but just reply within 24 hours rarely does it go over but it does happen.
When you say double message are you referring to, you sending a prompt message , get the match and they don’t write anything and you initiate the message again? I absolutely hate that, I’d rather they don’t even match with me if they don’t have any intention to even respond to my initial prompt question or even engage. If it’s just another follow up after a few days, depending if there was talk of making plans, I would just state when I am free and if they are interested they will respond.
Plenty of people aren’t necessarily checking every day, even if they’re serious about dating. Seems like overkill to actively remove people rather than simply leave it be, because where’s the harm? Someone awesome might well take longer than 24 hours to reply for a perfectly decent reason, and then you’ve missed out. I don’t think double messaging is ever worth it – if you’ve sent a message and got no reply, they’re either a) busy or b) rejecting you, and chasing them up won’t do anything but make the double messager look a bit desperate.
Bumble says 24 hours and that works for me.
I’m giving it a week. At that point, I feel like that’s enough time to allow for being busy, life happening, etc. If they haven’t responded back after that I assume they are either ignoring my message purposefully, ignoring my message because they are overwhelmed with chats/options, or because they are literally never getting on their apps. All of which, to me, are good indicators that they wouldn’t be a good fit for me.
I dont ever unmatch people unless theyre actively malicious. Just go with the flow if they respond they respond, if they dont they dont. I dont know them and they dont know me, i have no idea how busy their lives are and they most certainly do not know how busy mine is.
In the mean time just talk with everyone else until if they respond. Sometimes theyre just seeing if youre worth investing in. These are all things ive done. Sometimes i take 24-48 hours sometimes i just dont have the mental capacity to respond.
Why do you ask a question if your responses are all defending your stance? To each their own, but you sound like you’ve got a very high opinion of yourself without giving any potential matches any grace.
But I do appreciate the post! It makes me realize the ones who remove me if I don’t respond within 24 hours have done me a favor! Thanks for that perspective 😊
From your replies it sounds like you need to work on your anxiety and tendency to write stories. Someone taking more than 24 hours to reply isn’t “disrespecting” you or giving you “BS”. They’re living a life that doesn’t include you. They’re a whole person outside of that dating app, not a commodity you’re asessing for purchase. Having experienced adversity isn’t relevant but you keep brining it up to justify your defensive walls. Sounds like you’re catatrophizing because you’re too attached to these matches. Remember that they’re strangers and you’re not their priority. Nor should you be- do you really want someone so clingy that an online match is the center of their world?
You are doing them a favor by having such a quick cutoff so they can escape your highly unreasonable expectations that they not have a life.
It took me three days to message my now BF back 😬. I didn’t even realize this until we looked back at it lol. I was on nights when he messaged me, and sometimes when I’m on nights the rest of the world kind of ceases to exist for me, don’t have a lot of leftover energy etc.
I’m head over heels for this guy, and SO glad he didn’t unmatch due to my lack of reply the first day or two.
As for double messaging, don’t.
Cancelling someone due to not replying in 24hrs is a choice/preference/boundary. Simply if it’s OLD and we have never met before, you don’t take up a great deal of importance in my life. The point of dating is to see of you COULD potentially become that person.
So no, I wouldn’t cancel someone for 24hrs I’d prob say 3 days, and yes “double messaging” is fine.
Going to be honest here: you sound completely full of yourself and pretty unpleasant to be around, especially looking at some of your replies below.
>i have been with a lot of women… i don’t tend to tolerate much B.S in life i have built myself from absolutely nothing and been through a lot of adversity I’m pretty quick to walk away from behaviours that don’t meet my standards
“If you don’t reply within 24 hours, you’re a waste of time! I know this because I have been with many women and don’t tolerate ANY BS!” It sounds like this is an ego/insecurity thing of yours that has nothing to do with matches “being serious” or not. Folks our age tend to have this thing called “life” going on, and aren’t staring at their phones waiting for an OLD match notification to pop up 24/7.
You’ve mentioned your “very high standards,” which I don’t think is the case. You may have high standards, but that isn’t applicable here. Seems like you’re using it as a way to feel like you’re doing the rejecting rather than giving them a fair chance. So for someone who has these very high standards it sounds like you’re protecting your ego. Give people a chance!
I never removed or blocked anybody. I didn’t take it personally or feel rejected if they didn’t reply. I just moved on with my life. I know people who do what you do, it just seems really self conscious to me. Like if you are monitoring this that hard and removing people because it bothers you that much that an online stranger (might not even be a real person) didn’t respond to you I’d be concerned about your ability to handle “bigger” issues in life. It way too intense.
I travel a lot for work, so sometimes I don’t check the apps until a week later. FYI.
The main problem is that most apps failed to tell you someone message you
There’s no blanket right or wrong answer and people can only tell you what works for them. It’s an individual decision.
I tend to be more strict/”ruthless” as you said. I give 1-2 days max for a response, because based on my dating history, the women who have been serious/truly interested, have found/made the time to respond, and it’s hard to build rapport exchanging a single message every few days.
I also choose to engage with women who have a similar work/life balance and lifestyle in general, which removes the “maybe they’re just busy” variable from the equation and let’s me gauge interests/effort more easily. I also largely believe that’s an excuse people give and lend to others because they want the same grace, which is not wrong, but may be a valid incompatibility. In the past I’ve dated a brand new covid nurse working nightshift who established regular times to have chats/phone calls, and I’ve dated someone who truly had a ton of personal and professional things going on, including travel for work, who always still found time to send periodic update texts and occasional pics from her conferences.
There’s nothing wrong with wanting a responsive partner even from the initial match, and there’s also nothing wrong with needing/wanting to take time or not be pressed about a delay. It’s all about personal comfort and desire (within reason, because extremes either way are typically bad).
geeze, get over yourself. You are just a name and a face until conversation starts. I tend to get matches in waves, and I’m not about to run 10 conversations at once.
Or maybe I hit it off with someone else since I swiped your picture and in the meantime I’m just not gonna respond to anyone to see how that works out because I’m not a shitbag. But maybe that won’t make it past a couple dates and I’m still interested in you.
Whatever the reason, online dating isn’t the same as meeting in person. Timing not always going to line up, and when it doesn’t it isn’t rejection.
I used to give people a couple of days. Usually something like three to five days (insert joke of three to five business days). It just depends on you.
After that I would usually just kick them off. However, I must say that the male experience with matches on a dating website are very different from a female experience.
I’m definitely not on my OLD account every single day for sure. I probably only look twice a week, if that. If I flow with someone we usually continue our conversation on a better platform.
Just leave them alone
However long it takes for hinge to say the chat is inactive and move it to the hidden pile, think it’s like 2 weeks? I basically never have multiple matches at a time so I’ll check once a day in case hinge didn’t send a notification about a message. To me 2 weeks of no contact is an answer.
As to why I remove them it’s because that’s my way of moving on. If I leave the chat there I’ll be hoping and waiting for something. I go weeks or months between matches so if I just leave it there it is worse for me in the long run
I recently cleaned up some matches that hadn’t responded in like 3-4 weeks. I’d been busy on my end and hadn’t responded to some matches in over a week.
I had a major plumbing issue and had to move out of my house. This obviously had to be my top priority. So if a match is going to take that as lack of interest, well honestly, I’m probably better off not being with someone who jumps to conclusions.
You’re gonna have a lot of time on your hands if you are this ruthless
You can cut people off at 24 hours…. But realize some people aren’t constantly on the apps. There have been times when I don’t check for a week or more. I don’t expect people to wait, but if they message me after I’ve closed the app, I’m not even going to know there’s a message. If that eliminates me, so be it.