What a SuperCrush Is on Happn

A SuperCrush is a personal message you can send someone on happn before the two of you have a Crush. You can react to something specific, such as one of her photos, her description or the place you crossed paths. You can also send it with no message at all, and she is still notified. If she accepts it, it becomes a Crush and you can talk. If she refuses it, you will no longer cross paths with her on the app.

To send one, tap the blue star icon at the bottom right of the screen.

You can tie your message to a particular piece of what she has put up, whether that is a photo, the description she wrote, or the spot where your paths crossed. Or you can skip the message and send the SuperCrush on its own.

Either way, she gets a notification. That is the whole point of a SuperCrush. A normal Like is secret, and she only finds out about it if she likes you back. A SuperCrush tells her straight away.

Once she has it, she has two choices.

If she accepts, the SuperCrush becomes a Crush, which is happn's word for a match. From there the chat is open and works like any other.

If she refuses, you will not cross paths with her on happn again. That sounds harsh, but it is tidy. You get a clear answer instead of wondering, and she stops turning up on your Main Page.

You will not always hear back quickly. Some women open the app every day and some open it once a week, so give it time before you read anything into the silence.

a dating coach's view of super likes and roses on the other apps applies here almost word for word. Their value is that they bring your interest to her attention more than a normal like would. That raises the odds she actually looks at you rather than scrolling past.

On happn that matters more than it seems. A secret Like depends on her happening to tap the heart on you too. A SuperCrush puts you in front of her whether or not she would have gotten around to it.

And unlike a plain Like, it can carry words. You are not just raising a hand. You are opening the conversation before there is one.

a dating coach is just as clear about the downside. When you send one, you give away a little of your position. You have told her you are interested before she has decided anything about you.

He says you can recover from that if the rest of your game holds up and your messaging is good, and the extra attention can outweigh what you gave away. Without the good messaging, all a SuperCrush does is make a weak first impression land faster.

So a SuperCrush is not a shortcut around writing well. It is a way to get a good message seen by someone who might have missed it.

The best SuperCrush reacts to one specific thing and keeps it short.

a dating coach's approach to first messages is to look for anything unusual he can comment on, or gently tease, and to use as few words as he can. He also prefers commenting on what a woman wrote over commenting on her photos, because the first feels genuine and the second feels superficial.

The app gives you a third option that suits this well: the place you crossed paths. "Apparently we both live at that coffee place on Fifth" is specific, light and easy to answer. It shows you noticed something real, and it hints at an easy first date without asking for one.

What to avoid is the mismatch. Sending the strongest signal the app offers and then writing "hey" tells her she is special and proves you have nothing to say about her.

Send them rarely, and only to women you would be genuinely pleased to hear back from.

Each of the three hooks plays out a little differently. A reaction to her description is the safest, because it shows you read something she chose to write. A reaction to a photo works when the photo gives you something to talk about, like a place, a dog or an activity, rather than just her face. A reaction to the crossing location works almost every time, because it is specific to happn and it points quietly toward a date nearby.

The women worth a SuperCrush are the ones where you already know what your line will be. If you cannot think of anything specific to say, a normal Like is the better choice. It costs you nothing, it tells her nothing unless she likes you back, and it keeps your SuperCrushes for the moments they can actually do something.