What Does It Mean When Tinder Says You Missed a Match?

It means a woman had already Liked you, and you swiped left on her before you knew. Tinder's FAQ says that with Tinder Plus you can rewind and see her again. Its Rewind page adds that only subscribers can take back their last swipe, and that in some markets Rewind may be offered on a test basis.

A missed match has two halves. First, she saw your card and swiped right. Later, her card reached you, and you swiped left.

If you had swiped right, the two Likes would have made a match and the chat would have opened. Because you passed, there is no match. Tinder is telling you that you turned down a woman who had already said yes.

Sometimes. Rewind takes back your last swipe, so it helps only if she was the card you just passed. Rewind her and she is back in front of you. Like her this time, and because she already Liked you, that makes the match.

Two conditions apply. You need a subscription, because Tinder limits Rewind to subscribers, and its FAQ names Tinder Plus as a plan that lets you rewind. And she has to be your most recent swipe. If you have swiped on other people since, Rewind reaches only the last of them. Tinder's pages describe no other way back.

Missed matches come from one habit: deciding before you have looked.

A man swiping quickly judges on the first photo, often a bad angle or a group shot where he cannot tell which woman is which. He passes, and a moment later Tinder tells him she had Liked him. Given another second, she might have turned out to be exactly his type.

The former Tinder programmer who answered questions from the a dating program community told men to open cards and look through the photos. He said Tinder pays attention to that too. His words: "profile clicking and photo checking is a good idea for you guys."

One missed match is not a reason to subscribe. If it happens once in a while, let it go. There are other women in your stack, and one of them will be a match you actually looked at.

If it happens often, a subscription only treats the symptom. a dating coach's rule for paid features is to try one, see whether it makes a real difference, and drop it if it does not. Rewind will not make that difference if you keep swiping at the same speed. You will keep passing on women faster than you can take the passes back.

If you subscribe for other reasons and Rewind comes with your plan, treat it as a safety net rather than a way of swiping. Use it for the genuine slip, the card you meant to Like and flicked the wrong way. A man who relies on Rewind to correct his swiping is still deciding too fast.

There is good news in the message. Women are Liking you. Your card is doing its job for at least some of the women who see it.

The bad news is about your swiping, not about you. Each missed match is a small record of a moment when you decided on a woman before you looked at her. Treat it as information. If you see these often, some of your left swipes are catching women you would have wanted, and some of your right swipes are going to women you barely saw.

If Rewind is not an option, let her go properly. Do not go looking for her elsewhere, and do not spend the evening wondering who she was.

She is not the only woman who Liked you. The missed match proves that women who see your card sometimes say yes, which means others will too. Each of those is a match you can still catch, as long as you are looking when their cards come up.

The men who get the most out of Tinder treat any single card lightly. They look carefully, decide, and move on. A missed match is a reason to look more carefully next time, not a reason to feel you lost something you cannot replace.

Slow down on every card that might be a yes. Look at at least two of her photos and read what she wrote before you decide.

Do not judge on a weak first photo. Plenty of women lead with a group shot or an odd angle and have a clear, attractive photo further along. And when you are unsure, pause rather than pass. A few extra seconds on a maybe costs you nothing. A reflex left swipe on a woman who had already Liked you costs you the easiest match you were ever going to get.