Why your dating photo looks blurry

The blur is either in your file or in everything that happened after it. This reads your original file and tells you which.

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Focus is measured inside your face

Two readings decide whether a photo is soft. Both come from your original file. The first is the long edge, in pixels. The second is a focus reading, taken inside the box around your face and nowhere else.

Reading inside the face box is what makes the number worth having. Across a whole frame, the same measurement reports how much detail a scene holds. That is not the same as whether you are in focus. A plain wall scores low. A noisy blurry photo scores high, because noise reads as edges.

A blurred background is the case that matters most here. It is common, and behind a clear face it is not a fault. Measured across the frame it would drag the number down. Measured inside the face, it does not touch it.

The reading is also taken before anything is made smaller. The copy the AI looks at is smaller than your file. Shrinking a photo removes the fine detail that focus is measured from. So the numbers come from the file you uploaded, and that file answers the same way every time.

Under 640 pixels on the long edge: rated Weak, and too small to use.
Between 640 and 1280 pixels: rated Fair, and thin on detail full screen.
A focus reading under 55 inside the face box: your face is out of focus.
Above 110, with nothing else wrong, the file rates Strong.
Measured, not judged. The same file returns the same numbers on every run.

Fine on your phone, blurry in the app

This is the more common version of the question. The photo looks right in your camera roll and wrong on your profile. So the app takes the blame. Nothing here can confirm that. We never see your file once a dating app has it, and we will not print a guess.

The other half can be settled, and it is the half you can act on. Say the file is well past 1280 pixels with a face in focus. Then nothing is wrong with it, and uploading it again will change nothing. A small file with a soft face was already soft on your phone. Every copy made after that starts from less.

One thing does show up on our side. A screenshot is a copy of a copy. It arrives smaller than the photo it came from, and the long edge shows that plainly. If a screenshot is what you uploaded, the original is still in your photos. Use that one instead.

We measure your file. We cannot see what a dating app does to it afterwards.
A large original with a face in focus means the softness is not in your file.
A screenshot is smaller than the photo it came from, and the long edge shows it.
Upload the original from your photos, not a copy saved out of another app.

What actually happens

You upload the photos you are already using, or the ones you are deciding between. Every photo is judged on its own, never against your others. Each photo comes back with where it goes on your profile, six ratings, and what to improve.

Where it goes runs from use this first to do not use this one. The three answers in between are use this second, somewhere in the middle, and keep this for later. A photo where your face is small can still belong in the middle. It is placed there rather than marked down for it.

Each rating is Strong, Solid, Fair or Weak. Two of the six ratings are measured from your file. AI looking at the photo judges the other four. When a photo does not show enough to judge something, the rating says so. It reads Not clear enough, instead of a confident word nobody can trust.

Can they see your face — measured from your file.
Light and focus — measured from your file.
What is around you — judged by AI looking at the photo.
Eyes and posture — judged by AI looking at the photo.
How natural it looks — judged by AI looking at the photo.
Something to ask about — judged by AI looking at the photo.

It names the fault, not a number

A score out of ten tells you nothing you can act on. So there is no score here, no number and no percentage. What to improve is at most three short lines, written about your photo rather than picked from a fixed set.

Often there is nothing worth changing, and the list comes back empty. That is a good result, not a failure. A line appears only when the fault costs the photo something real.

Some faults can be corrected in the photo you already have. A correction is offered when a rating is Fair or Weak and the fault can honestly be corrected. It can also decline, and say that a new photo would serve you better. The check is free. Correcting a photo costs one credit.

There is no fix for detail that is gone

Two findings here come back with no correction attached, on purpose. Out of focus is one. Too small to use is the other. Detail the camera never recorded is not hidden in the file, waiting to be brought back. Anything offering to restore it is inventing new detail. On a photo of your face, that means a face that is not quite yours.

So the button simply does not appear. A photo with a soft face is turned down whole. That holds even when something else in it could have been corrected. A photo handed back still failing the thing that mattered is worse than one honestly refused. It was paid for.

Other faults are a different case. Too dark, too bright, lost detail in the brightest areas, somebody at the edge of the frame. Those pixels are all still there, so those can be corrected. A correction costs one credit.

The honest answer to a soft photo is a different photo. That is a worse sentence to sell and a better one to read.

Findings about focus and resolution carry no fix, deliberately.
A soft face turns down the whole photo, even when another fault could be corrected.
Brightness, colour and a distracting edge can be corrected. That detail is still there.
Correcting a photo costs one credit, and signing up includes two free photos.

What it will not do

It reads what is visible in a photograph. It does not know you, and it is not judging you.
Every photo is judged on its own. We never compare your photos to each other.
It cannot tell you whether a specific person will like you, and nothing can.
It has no access to your dating app account, your match count or your likes.
The check is free and it does not ask for a card.

Once you know which photo is the problem

Knowing a photo has to go is useful on its own. It is more useful when the replacement is one you can actually get, which is the part generating is for: your own face, in the photo your profile is short of.

Generate your dating photos

Questions

Why do my photos look blurry on Tinder but fine on my phone?

We cannot see what a dating app does to your file, so we do not guess. We measure the file instead. Suppose the original is large and your face is in focus. Then the softness is not in what you sent, and uploading it again changes nothing. If the numbers come back low, the file was already soft before any app touched it.

Can a blurry photo be fixed?

Not the blur itself. Detail the camera never recorded is not sitting in the file, waiting to be recovered. Anything claiming to restore it is drawing something new onto your face. So findings about focus and resolution arrive with no fix attached, and no correction is offered. Too dark, too bright and a distracting edge are different. Those pixels exist, so those can be corrected.

How blurry is too blurry?

Size and focus are two separate readings. Under 640 pixels on the long edge, a photo is rated Weak and called too small to use. Between 640 and 1280 it is Fair, and thin on detail full screen. Focus is read inside the box around your face. A value under 55 there means the face is soft, whatever the background is doing.

Does a blurred background count against my photo?

No. Sharpness is measured inside your face box and nowhere else. A soft background behind a clear face reads as clear. Measuring the whole frame would invert that. A plain wall scores low, because there is little detail in it. A noisy blurry photo scores high, because noise reads as edges. The reading answers one question: are you in focus.