What Questions Are on the Raya Application?

The Raya application is less a quiz than a short portrait of you. Press coverage describes it asking for your age, your location and your work, plus a short written section, a slideshow set to a song you pick, and an Instagram login. TechCrunch also reported an essay question. Raya does not publish the form, so treat all of this as reported, and expect the exact wording to differ from what you read here.

Bustle reports the application asks for a main profile picture, a short bio, your age, your location and your work information. It says applicants upload a set of images for a slideshow that plays to a background song.

TechCrunch described the same slideshow as a video set to music of the applicant's choice, and said applicants also answer an essay question. That is the one item that looks like a real question. Everything else is information about you.

Bustle reports that you apply through Instagram. Your handle shows on the application, so the people reviewing it can see the account behind it.

Treat that account as part of your answer. Reviewers who can see your posts are reading more than your form. If the form says one thing and the account says another, the form loses.

Bustle also reports that a referral from someone already on the app is part of the process. You may not have a friend on Raya, and that is not a reason to invent one. If you do know a member, ask him plainly. If you do not, send the application as it is.

Plain, specific and true beats clever. A committee reading many applications remembers the specific ones.

• Work. Say what you do in words a stranger understands. "I run a small company that installs solar panels" is better than a job title only your industry knows.
• Location. Give the real city. Do not stretch it to the nearest famous one.
• Written answer. Write two or three sentences about something you actually do, such as the thing you cook, build or train for. A detail will be remembered, and a trait like "adventurous" will not.
• The essay. If you get one, answer the question that is asked, in your normal voice, and stop. A short, honest answer reads better than a long one trying to impress.

The slideshow is the part you control most, and it is the part men rush.

Choose images that show different sides of your life: where you spend a weekday, where you spend a weekend, who you spend it with. Skip anything that needs a caption to make sense. Pick a song you would actually play, because reviewers can tell when a choice was made to look good and not to sound like you.

Keep it short. Ten images that each say something beat thirty that repeat each other.

Raya's App Store listing says applications are reviewed by its global committee on an ongoing basis, and that review can range from days to months. It does not say what makes one application faster than another.

Send it once, send it well, and then leave it alone. Resubmitting or fretting does not move you up. The useful thing to do is get on with the rest of your dating while the committee works.

It is not the thing that makes you attractive. Raya accepting you means a committee liked your application, and it does not mean women will write back. The men who do well on a private app are the same men who do well on any other: clear pictures, a real line about their life, and a first message that asks about something specific.

Do the work on those, and the application becomes one more place that same version of you shows up, not a test you have to pass.