What Are Members in Common on Raya?

Raya is a dating app, and its privacy policy covers what one member sees on another's page. The app shows the viewer the information they have in common, such as Instagram accounts they both follow. The overlap is worked out separately for each viewer. Two different women can open your page and see two different lists, because each list is built from the accounts she shares with you.

The wording in Raya's privacy policy is about information in common. Its example is mutually followed Instagram accounts.

We are working from that wording, not from what the app labels the section, so if the screen in front of you uses a different name, trust the screen. What does not change is the idea. The app compares your connections with the connections of whoever is looking, and shows only the overlap.

This is the point men miss. The common connections are not a fixed feature of your page. They belong to the pair of you.

If you follow a climbing gym, a restaurant in your neighborhood and a band, a woman who follows the gym and the band will see those two. A woman who follows neither sees neither. Nothing on your page changes between her visit and the next woman's. The list moves because the person looking is different.

So you cannot decide in advance what any one woman will see. You can only decide what you follow.

Raya applications use an Instagram account. Raya's policy says a private Instagram account stays private. Only the content a member chooses to share with Raya users is visible to other members.

That puts the control where it belongs, with you. If you are careful about who sees your Instagram, the app does not override that. Check what your Instagram settings actually show before you apply, because that is the account Raya reads.

Only members whose applications were accepted can see a Raya page. Applicants on the waitlist cannot see members, and members cannot see them.

So the overlap is only ever shown inside the room. A woman who is not a member does not see your common connections, and a man waiting for a decision does not see hers.

A chat only opens after both people like each other. The in-common details are therefore what a woman reads before she decides, not after.

Shared follows give you something real to say. If you and a woman both follow the same small restaurant, a first message about the place is easier to write than a greeting.

a dating coach's habit when he matches is to scroll through the woman's page looking for something unusual he can comment on, and then to say something specific about it. The common connections do part of that work for you, because they are already in front of you.

A line like "We both follow the ramen place on Fourth. Have you tried the spicy one?" does more than "Hey, how are you?" It shows you read her page and picked a detail, and it asks a question she can answer in a sentence.

Sometimes the list is short or empty. Do not read it as a verdict. It only means the two of you follow different accounts.

What a short list cannot do is carry a conversation, so be ready with something else. Her photos and her words are still there. Pick one and ask about it.

You cannot see ahead of time what any woman will share with you. But you can make the list say something true. If you follow ten accounts about things you really do, the overlap with a woman who shares one of them will mean something. If you follow three celebrity accounts and nothing else, there is little to talk about.

Do not go and follow accounts you do not care about to pad the overlap. A woman can tell, and the first conversation that depends on an interest you faked goes nowhere.

Keep the rest of the page honest too. Photos that look like you, a short bio in plain words, and a clear idea of what you want. The in-common list is only a small part of what she reads. It helps, and it does not carry the page.