OkCupid profile questions — all 53, with sample answers

The opening section, and the one most people fill in first. Answers here set the register for everything below.

• My self-summary

  Engineer who moved here for a job and stayed for the food. Most weekends I am trying to find a better dosa than the one near my old flat. Still losing.

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• Favorite thing about the place I live

  There is a bakery below my building that starts at 5am, so the whole flat smells like bread before my alarm goes off. I have mostly stopped setting the alarm.

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• Me, a Haiku

  Wakes up with a plan / Reads the news for far too long / Plan is now ruined

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• Most people that know me would say I'm

  The one who books the restaurant. Not because I am organised, but because I do not trust anyone else to check whether it is actually good.

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• Favorite memory from my childhood

  Power cuts in summer. The whole building ended up on the terrace and someone’s dad always had a radio. The best nights of my childhood had no electricity.

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• Things I am not

  A morning person, a confident swimmer, or someone who can be trusted to watch just one episode.

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Forward-looking questions. These pull the best replies from people who want something specific out of dating.

• Current goal

  Learning to cook one dish well enough to make it without thinking. Currently on attempt fourteen of a biryani that keeps coming out almost right.

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• One day, I would like to

  Live somewhere I can walk to everything. I have never had that and I suspect it would change my entire personality.

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• I'd like to be known for my

  Patience. I am not naturally patient, so it would mean I actually managed to change something about myself.

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• If money were no concern, this is what I would be doing

  Restoring old furniture. There is a broken chair at my parents’ place that has been broken for twelve years and I think about it more than I should admit.

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• My dream job is

  Something where I finish the day knowing exactly what I did. My current job is good but I have never once explained it successfully at a wedding.

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• What I'm doing with my life

  Building software people actually use, badly playing guitar, and slowly convincing myself that this is the year I run a half marathon.

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Low-stakes bragging. The trick is picking a skill small enough to be believable and odd enough to be memorable.

• I like to make

  Playlists far too long for the occasion. A friend asked for road-trip music and received four hours for a two-hour drive.

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• I could probably beat you at

  Any pub quiz round about geography. I will be no help at all on sports, film, or anything after 2015.

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• My patronus

  A street dog that has decided your scooter is now its scooter. Friendly, immovable, slightly smug.

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• I want to be better at

  Saying no early, instead of saying yes and then quietly panicking about it for two weeks.

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• My worst quality

  I go quiet when I am annoyed instead of just saying so. Genuinely working on it, but you would notice it by month three.

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• I'm really good at

  Remembering what people ordered last time. Useless skill, but it makes people feel oddly seen.

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Self-description without the résumé voice. One concrete habit beats three adjectives.

• My style can be described as

  The same four shirts in rotation and one jacket I am slightly too attached to.

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• I love this about myself

  I am genuinely happy when my friends do well. No sting, no quiet comparison. It took me until about 27 to get there.

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• My go-to dance

  Minimal upper body, confident nodding, and a two-step I have been doing since school. It works because I stopped questioning it.

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• My golden rule

  If someone is telling you a story they are excited about, do not check your phone. That is the whole rule.

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• My weirdest quirk

  I read the last page of a book first. Not to spoil it — I just need to know everyone is okay before I can relax.

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• The first thing people notice about me

  That I talk with my hands enough to be a genuine hazard at small tables.

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What you actually require, stated plainly. The most useful section for filtering out mismatches early.

• If I could only eat one food for the rest of time it would be

  Curd rice. Boring answer, correct answer. It fixes bad days, hot days, and whatever I did to my stomach the night before.

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• This item makes me feel at home

  A steel tumbler for coffee. Ceramic and plastic both feel wrong now and I cannot defend this position.

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• My partner should be

  Someone who tells me when I am being unreasonable — kindly, and reasonably early.

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• I couldn't function without these apps

  Maps, a notes app full of half-finished thoughts, and one that reminds me to water the plants. The plants are still alive.

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• I value

  People who follow up. If you say you will send something and then send it, we are going to get along.

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• Six things I could never do without

  Filter coffee, a bookshop within walking distance, my brother’s phone calls, running shoes, a window seat, and the specific silence of Sunday mornings.

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What you do with unclaimed time. Specific beats broad — the exact show, not "TV".

• I spend a lot of time thinking about

  Why some cities feel walkable and others do not. I have gone down this hole enough times to be genuinely annoying about it at dinner.

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• I like to take pictures of

  Shop signs with hand-painted lettering. I have about four hundred and absolutely no plan for them.

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• My favorite conspiracy theory

  That season three is where the writers of any show stop caring. I have assembled evidence and I am happy to present it.

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• Last video I watched on YouTube

  A forty-minute breakdown of how a bridge collapsed in 1940. I do not work in engineering. I have no explanation for this.

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• The last show I binged

  Finished six seasons in nine days and now I do not know what to do with my evenings. Recommendations genuinely welcome.

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• I should spend less time

  Reading reviews of things I have already bought.

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Scenes from your real week. These give a match something to picture, which is what makes them easy to reply to.

• On a typical Friday night I am

  Either out until 2am or in bed by ten with a book. There is no middle version of me and I have stopped fighting it.

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• A perfect day

  No alarm, a long breakfast, a walk with nowhere to be, and running into someone I like without having planned it.

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• Best day of my life so far

  The day my sister’s kid learned my name and then just shouted it for an hour. Low bar, apparently, but there it is.

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• Ideal weekend routine

  Saturday busy, Sunday completely empty. I need one of each or the week starts badly.

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• When I die, I will

  Leave behind an indefensible number of half-read books.

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• On a typical Wednesday I am

  Discovering that Wednesday is not the quiet day I assumed it was, and moving everything I had moved to Wednesday.

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OkCupid's most personal section. Vulnerable lands well; unresolved heaviness does not. Aim for composed, not confessional.

• The most private thing I'm willing to admit

  I rehearse phone calls before making them. Even short ones. Even ordering food.

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• The last time I was embarrassed

  Waved at someone across a cafe who was waving at the person behind me, then committed fully and pretended I was stretching.

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• This is the saddest song ever written

  Not a sad song on paper, but someone played Landslide at a wedding once and quietly undid the entire room, including me.

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• My biggest regret

  Not calling my grandfather back the week he asked me to. He was not ill, there was no reason, I just did not do it.

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• My relationship with my mother

  Good now. Complicated for about a decade before that. We talk on Sundays and mostly do not discuss the decade.

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Direct statements about what you want. The one section where being blunt helps more than it costs.

• You should message me if

  You hold strong opinions about unimportant things. Tell me the correct route across the city, or why your local bakery is overrated.

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• What I'm actually looking for

  Something steady. I am not in a rush, but I am not casually browsing either, and I would rather say that than waste your evening.

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• Before I go on a date with someone I need to know that

  That we have had at least one real conversation first. Not a compatibility test — I just do not do well meeting strangers completely cold.

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• I will never date someone that

  Is rude to staff. It is the oldest test there is because it still works.

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• My worst date

  We ran out of things to say in eleven minutes and then both ordered a second drink out of politeness. Longest hour of that year.

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• For our first date, let's

  Get coffee somewhere with a walk nearby — so if it is going well there is an obvious next move, and if it is not, there is not.

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