Why Is My Dating App Age Range Not Working?

Usually the age range is working and a second setting is overriding it. Hinge has a preference you can mark flexible. Bumble has an option that shows people outside your filters once you run out of people inside them. Hily would rather show you someone than nobody. Check those switches first, and then check that the age on your own account is correct.

On Hinge, every user can filter by age range. Each preference can be marked flexible with the box "Show profiles outside of this preference." With that box ticked, Hinge is allowed to show you people outside the range you typed in.

If you want a hard limit, untick it. Hinge also says its dating preferences are private filters that nobody else can see, so nobody sees how you set it.

One thing does not bend. Hinge says gender preferences are strict by default and cannot be loosened. If you are seeing the wrong gender, that is a separate problem and not an age range setting.

Bumble's basic filters include age. It also has an option called "Show other people if I run out." When that is on, once you have seen everyone within your filters, Bumble may show people outside them.

That is the most common reason a man sees a woman who is too young or too old for his range on Bumble. He ran out of people who matched, and the app kept going.

Bumble also tells members that the more filters they apply, the fewer people they are likely to see, and to adjust the filters if things seem quiet. So a narrow age range plus a short distance plus a few other filters can empty your feed quickly. Then the "run out" option kicks in, and it looks as if the age range stopped working.

Hily lists age range among its free Finder filters. It also says it would rather show interesting people farther away than no one when it runs out of nearby profiles. So if your area is thin, the app loosens the search so that you have something to look at, instead of an empty screen.

The practical point is that an app is built to keep you swiping. A feed with nobody in it is a failure for the app. A wider feed is its fix.

happn gives a different first answer. Its help advice for members who no longer see new profiles is to check that the age on their account is correct and that their preferences are set clearly in the My Preferences tab.

An old or wrong birth year can change who the app thinks you are looking at and who sees you. Fix that first. Then reopen the preferences and set them again, one at a time, so you can see what each one changes.

Run through these in order.

1. Find any switch that lets the app show people outside the range, and decide whether you want it on.
2. Count your filters. Age, distance and anything else you set all narrow the same feed.
3. Check the age on your account.
4. Restart the app and look again.

If it still does not match, widen the range yourself by a couple of years and see who appears. A man who shrinks his range and then runs out of people is making the app do the thing he is annoyed about.

A tight age range feels efficient. For many men it costs more than it saves. a dating coach's advice on online dating is to be selective in who you like. You can only be selective about the women you can see, and a range a few years wider than your first instinct gives you more of them to choose from.

Set a range you can live with, keep the flexible options off if you want strict limits, and spend your attention on the women who appear. The age range is a tool for sorting, not a way to make a good feed. The feed gets good when your photos and first message are good.