Which Dating Sites Let You Set a Religious Preference?

Hinge, OkCupid and Bumble all let you set a religious preference, in different ways. Hinge includes Religion among the Dating Preferences every user can filter by. OkCupid puts Religion under Background Preferences. Bumble lets you add religion to your own page for free, but its Advanced Filters sit inside Bumble Premium. In each case, the preference narrows what you see, and what you list about yourself is a separate choice.

Hinge splits the idea into two places. Under My Virtues you can list Religious Beliefs on your page, and you decide whether to display or hide each detail.

Under Dating Preferences, Religion is one of the filters all Hinge users can use. Other filters, such as Height, Politics and Education Level, are for subscribers.

Hinge Dating Preferences are private. They act only as filters, and other members cannot see them. You can also make a preference flexible, so profiles outside it still show.

OkCupid lets members set a preference for Religion. It sits under Background Preferences, next to Languages, Ethnicity, Politics, Education, Employment and Astrological Sign.

It is the most detailed of the three, because the same area covers a long list of background questions, not only religion.

On Bumble, religion is one of the optional details you can add under About you in Edit profile. Bumble says it is up to you whether to include it.

Its Advanced Filters are part of Bumble Premium. There is one more rule worth knowing: you can only use a filter if you have added that information to your own page. A man who filters by religion but never listed his own may find the filter will not work for him.

Setting a preference makes the list shorter. It does not make a woman on that list more interested in you.

If you filter hard, you shrink the pool and with it the number of matches you will see in a week. In a numbers game of matches, replies, numbers and dates, which is how a dating coach describes online dating, a smaller pool is a real cost. Use a strict filter only when the preference is truly non-negotiable for you, and keep it flexible where Hinge allows that.

Whether to put yours on the page is a separate question, and it is yours. On all three apps the detail is optional. A man for whom it matters will usually be better off stating it. The women who care can then pick him, and the ones who do not can move on without spending a conversation.

A man who does not care much can leave it off. Neither choice affects how a woman reads your photos, and neither replaces a good opening line.

One practical point on Hinge: because you choose whether each detail is displayed or hidden, you can fill it in for your own use of the filters and still keep it off your page. Bumble works the other way around, since its filter only works if you have added the detail to your own page first. Check which rule applies before you plan around it.

If a woman's page lists a faith that matters to her, a message that refers to something she wrote will do better than a generic opener. Ask about the thing she chose to put there, in a plain way, and avoid a debate in the first exchange.

If you share her faith, say so once and move on to something about her week. If you do not, do not pretend. A first date built on a pose gets awkward fast. A woman who made the effort to list her faith is also telling you what she hopes to find, so reading it takes a minute and pays back in the first reply.

Use religion as a filter if it decides whether you could date someone long term. Skip it if it only decides whether the first drink is comfortable. Most men are better served by setting the filters that cannot be negotiated, leaving the rest open, and spending the saved effort on messages that get a reply.