Online dating apps can be awkward, intimidating, scary and frustrating, and one of the trickiest situations to navigate is what to do when you see a girl from Tinder in real life.



There have been plenty of times when I was on Tinder years ago when I had what could be called an overnight relationship. You know what I’m talking about — because you’ve probably experienced something similar.

It’s when you and a girl match, swap messages all night long and maybe even set a time later that week to meet up. However, once the morning comes, you’ve both already moved on, either ghosting one another or falling down the message queue into oblivion. That’s where awkwardness might set in — especially if you ever see her in real life.

As someone who has had his fair share of “oh, man, that girl’s from Tinder” moments before, I can tell you it’s a strange feeling. What do you do? Do you approach her? If so, what do you say?

Take a deep breath, guys, because I’m here to help you through that moment. So here’s how to handle the situation of seeing a girl from an online dating app in real life.

Ignore her

There’s a right way to play things and a wrong way to play things — and ignoring a girl you see from an online dating app in real life is the wrong way. That said, you probably have your reasons for doing it; like she blocked you, you met her once and things didn’t click or something else. If that’s the case, you should still at least take the high road and give her a hello. Bars are small, and chances are she recognizes you, so avoid any potential drunken encounter by saying hi and getting rid of the elephant in the room.

Introduce yourself as a stranger would

Whether either one of you want to admit it or not, you probably realize who the other is — as well as how you know each other. Rather than spin your wheels in your mind about all that, you might just want to go up and introduce yourself as if you were any other random guy at the bar. Of course, there’s a chance she’ll call you on your BS, but that may make things lighthearted in the end anyway, helping the conversation moving forward.

Introduce yourself and tell her how you know her

If you really want to address the elephant in the room, go in confidently and just outright tell her that you know her from an online dating app. It doesn’t need to be more specific than that — like when you matched or how long ago it was — but simply that you remember matching with her and messaging a few times. It’s cool and collected, without the awkwardness.

Use the whole online dating apps angle to your advantage

Going along the above, you can use the online dating app thing to your advantage in a big way, you just need to come in with a strong icebreaker. Sure, she may not remember you at all, but she will remember that she’s on a dating app, and that you remembered swiping on her will be flattering.

It doesn’t matter if you matched, messaged or anything else, either, you can just approach her as if you’re someone who has seen her in a public place before, simply saying, “so, this is a little embarrassing, but didn’t I see you on Tinder?” It’s a cute way to show you’re interested without being judgmental for any reason.

Whatever you do, play it cool

However you approach the situation, do not freak out and give too much detail. Sure, you may have been one of those guys who went from swiping to following her on Instagram because her profile’s linked up, but you don’t need to get into all that business. You simply just need to go in confidently and use the online dating app as your icebreaker to talk to her, from there, you’ll be able to see her interest level.