Why Are OkCupid Intros Not Showing?

An Intro is a first message from someone you have not Liked yet, and it lands in your Intros tab. If the tab looks short, remember that free members see one Intro at a time while paid members see all of them at once. If you got a notification and the tab is empty, the Intro is no longer on OkCupid or you passed on the page that sent it.

This is the most common reason the tab looks thin. Without a paid subscription you are shown a single Intro, then the next, so a free account will never show a full stack of them. If you are paid, you see all your Intros at once.

So a free account that has several Intros waiting can look as if almost nothing has come in. It has. You are just seeing them one by one.

You got a notification, you opened the app, and there is nothing there. OkCupid's help center gives two explanations. The Intro is no longer on OkCupid, or you passed on the page that sent it.

The first is the one that stings. An Intro that disappeared can mean you blocked the person, she blocked you, she deleted her account, her account is in a moderation hold, or she was banned. OkCupid does not say which, and you cannot find out by trying.

The second is the one you can check yourself. If you pass on a page, the Intro that came from it goes with her. If you flicked through quickly and passed on a woman who had written to you, that is where it went.

OkCupid sometimes holds messages while its staff review whether they come from a legitimate account. Once the account is judged legitimate, the message is released.

So an Intro that never arrived may simply be waiting. Nothing about this is under your control, and nothing about it is a comment on you. If a woman says she wrote to you and you see nothing, that hold is one reasonable explanation.

Once you send an Intro, OkCupid will not show that person to you again until she Likes you back. This works in the other direction too. If you wrote to a woman and then wonder why she has vanished from Discover, that is the rule in action, not a fault.

It also means an Intro is a real decision. You send one, and you wait for her to respond in the only way that matters, by Liking you back.

When an Intro vanishes, men often make it worse.

• Do not open a second account to look for her. It solves nothing and creates new problems.
• Do not write a long message to a stranger asking why she disappeared. If she blocked you, you may not be able to reach her at all. If she did not, you have started with neediness.
• Do not take a missing Intro as proof that a woman rejected you. Most of the explanations above have nothing to do with you.

Check what you can check. Look at your own Blocked list if you are unsure, and then move on.

Some men ask this question because very few Intros come in. That is a different problem, and the cause is usually what women see when they find your page.

A woman decides in a few seconds. She sees your lead picture and reads your first lines. Make the picture recent and clear, with your face easy to see, and write one line that only you could have written. a dating coach's blunt version is that a boring, average page gets the average result, which is no one writing to you.

An Intro you send works the same way. It puts you toward the front of her Discover, so the quality of your message and your page matter together.

Reply to the Intros you do have, and do it quickly. A woman who wrote to you first is the warmest conversation on the app, because she has already shown interest. Pick one specific thing in her message and respond to it in a line or two.

My aim is to get from a first message to her number in four to seven exchanges, bringing up a drink early as a light idea and not a formal invitation. A woman who opened the conversation is the easiest place to start.