Guide · Profiles

How to write a dating profile when your pet is the main character

Updated September 15, 2026 · 5 min read

On a normal dating app, your pet is a photo prop. On Attune the pet has its own card and the human is the small circle, so this is really about two profiles: the pet's and yours. The advice below works for either kind of app.

What to say about the pet

Three things, and only three:

1. Name, and what they are. "Ziggy, beagle, nine." Breed or a guess; "shelter special, probably some shepherd" is fine and, honestly, charming.
2. One specific true thing. Not a trait, a scene. "Steals socks and hides them in the bath." "Will not walk past a bakery." "Has a nemesis, a squirrel, named Kevin." A specific detail is what people reply to.
3. What your life looks like because of them. This is the bit that actually matters for dating. "Up at six every day, in bed by ten, on a trail most weekends." It tells a match whether their life fits yours before either of you wastes a week.

What to leave out

• "Must love dogs." Everyone here does.
• "My dog is my child" or "fur baby." It is not that people disagree; it is that it says nothing.
• "If my dog does not like you, it is over." True or not, it reads as a threat.
• A list of breeds you would never date. Keep it for the settings, not the bio.
• The pet's entire medical history. Save it for the third date.

Photos

One photo with the pet, and it should be a good one: outdoors, daylight, both of you looking at the camera or at each other. Not the pet from above on the couch. Not you holding the pet up like a trophy.

Then at least two photos that are clearly, unambiguously you. People joke about profiles where you cannot tell which one is the human; it is not funny when you are swiping.

On Attune, the pet's card gets its own photos, so make the pet photo a portrait, at the pet's eye level, with a clean background. Cats: near a window, not under a bed.

The human part

Your bio should be about you, and the pet should appear in it as context, not content. Try this shape: one line about what you do or care about, one line about how you spend a weekend, one line that only you could write. The pet fits naturally into the weekend line.

An example that works:

Nurse, nights, so my weekends are Tuesdays. Ziggy and I do the Trolley Track Trail most mornings and end at whichever coffee place has the patio open. I make a very serious lasagne and will judge yours.

An example that does not:

Dog mom! Ziggy is my whole world and if you can't handle that, swipe left. Must love dogs. No drama.

For cat people

Say so early, say the cat's name, and say what kind of cat it is: the lap kind, the ignore-you kind, the fetch kind. Cat people are looking for each other and they read carefully. "Two cats, Bean and Toast, one of them will sit on you within a minute and the other will take a month" is a complete profile in one line.

For people without a pet

Say what you are open to, and be specific: "No pet yet. Grew up with big dogs, would happily be a weekend dog step-parent, cats make me sneeze." Attune has a whole path for this, and the honesty is what makes it work.