Why Happn Shows You People Who Are Far Away

happn shows you the people you have crossed paths with first. Once you have gone through those, it starts filling your home page with people who are farther away, a little at a time, out to a much wider radius around you. So when distant faces take over your feed, it usually means you have already seen everyone you crossed recently, and the app is topping the page up.

Think of the home page in two layers.

The top layer is the people you actually crossed paths with. They come first because that is the whole point of happn: people whose routines overlap with yours.

The second layer is everyone else nearby. Once you have interacted with the people you crossed, happn gradually adds people further out so the page does not simply go empty. They are real users, and some of them are well worth a look. But they are not people you crossed, and they can be a long way from your door.

There is a quick check. Open her profile and scroll to the very last page.

If there is a map there, you crossed paths. If there is no map, you did not, and she is one of the people happn added from further away.

It takes two seconds, and it tells you something useful before you decide anything. A woman you crossed shares part of your routine. A woman with no map might live across town, or in the next town over.

If you keep reaching the far-away layer quickly, there are three usual reasons.

The first is that you have been through everyone. Once you have acted on all your recent crossings, only the wider pool is left until new crossings come in. That is normal, and it fixes itself as your week goes on.

The second is your location settings. happn needs location turned on to record any crossings at all, and on an iPhone its own instructions are to set its location access to Always. The app keeps registering crossings while it sits closed in your pocket, but only if it is allowed to.

The third is your routine. If your week is home, desk and home again, there are very few places where a crossing can happen. The app can only report the ground you cover.

This is not a small detail. Distance is one of the quiet reasons dates from the apps fall apart.

a dating coach's first rule for dates that start on the apps is to set the date near your place, walking distance if you can manage it. He puts that ahead of choosing a nice venue. He tells a story about a first date with a woman who was completely his type. The chemistry was great, but she lived on the far side of the city, and getting back to either place was awkward. The night ended there. Then their schedules changed, he started traveling, and there was never a second date.

A woman you crossed on happn usually spends time close to where you do. That makes the easy date, the one a short walk from your place, much easier to set up. A woman forty minutes away turns every plan into a negotiation.

None of this means you should ignore the second layer. If she is exactly your type, Like her.

Just be honest with yourself about the logistics before you invest. If you get a Crush, raise the question of where you both are early, in a light way. "You look like you're a fair way out. Do you ever come into town?" gives her a chance to tell you whether distance is a problem for her before either of you has spent a week chatting.

If she is keen and the distance is real, make the plan easy for her. Pick a place near a train station, or suggest a night when she is already coming your way. Keep the second venue near your place if you can. A long trip followed by a date in the middle of nowhere is how good chemistry turns into nothing.

The best fix for a feed full of distant people is more people you actually crossed.

Keep location on and set to what happn asks for. Carry your phone as you go about your day. Then look at your week. A different coffee shop on the way to work, a gym instead of the home workout, lunch out twice a week instead of at your desk. Each one adds a place where crossings can happen.

You are not changing your life for an app. You are just giving the app more of the life you already have. The women you cross that way are the ones you can realistically see on a Thursday night, and those are the ones worth your Likes.