Can You Reactivate a Plenty of Fish Account?

Not if you deleted it. POF's help center says deleted accounts cannot be reactivated. To use the app again you create a new account, and all your photos, chat history and matches from the old one are deleted forever. If you only paused your account with Take a Break, nothing was deleted, and using the app again ends the break.

There are two very different ways to leave Plenty of Fish, and they have opposite answers.

If you chose Delete, the account is gone for good. POF offers no reactivation, and there is no button that restores it.

If you chose Take a Break, your account was never removed. It was paused. POF says that when you start using the app again the break stops, and your information and photos are still there. So the first thing to work out is which of the two you did, because one of them is a non-problem.

POF's answer is plain: you cannot reactivate it, so you make a new account.

Three things stay behind when you do. Your photos, your chat history and your matches are deleted forever. Any upgrade you paid for on the old account does not transfer to the new one. And the new account starts as an empty page, so you will be writing your details and choosing your photos again.

Read that last point as an opportunity. Most men who delete an account did it because it was not working. Starting again with the same three photos and the same one-line description gets you the same result. Spend the first evening on the account instead. Get better photos, write a clearer set of details about your life, and prepare a first message that picks one real detail from the woman you are writing to.

Take a Break is the not-so-permanent option. It pauses your account without deleting it. When you start using the app again, the break stops and everything you had is still in place.

Two limits are worth knowing. POF says Take a Break can only be turned on in the app and on mobile web, not on desktop. And it is temporarily available only in certain regions, so you may not see it at all where you live.

If you are reading this because you left for a few weeks and want back in, open the app and log in. You should not need a new account.

Do not assume the account is gone because the app refuses you. A forgotten password looks the same from the outside.

POF suggests resetting your password at its password reset page first. Request the link to the email on the account and follow it. If you then see a message saying your account has been deleted, contact POF Support, because only the company can tell you what happened.

If the reset email does not arrive, try each email address you might have used, because an account is tied to the address it was opened with. Check the spam folder as well.

This is the one case where there is no way back. POF says banned members are not allowed to create new accounts, and a ban decision is final.

So opening a new account to get around a ban is not an option, and trying to is a poor use of your time. If you think the ban was a mistake, contact Support. If it was not, put your effort into meeting women in person, which does not depend on any app.

A fresh account is a chance to do the part you probably rushed the first time.

Choose photos first. Women judge you by your weakest picture, so every one has to be clear, with your face easy to see and nobody else in the frame. Be selective when you swipe, too. a dating coach's experience is that an app which watches a man say yes to nearly everyone treats him as a man with no standards and shows him fewer of the women he actually wants.

Then keep it simple. Swipe on women you would genuinely ask out and answer your matches the day they arrive. When a conversation is going well, suggest a specific drink on a specific evening. The aim of the app is a date, and every day of messages without a plan makes one less likely.