Valentine's Day When You've Just Started Dating
Entry No. 203 ·
By The IF Team
If you have only just started dating someone, Valentine’s Day works best small and mutual: acknowledge it, but do not let it become a verdict on the relationship. A few weeks in, a warm message or a low-key plan is plenty. A couple of months in, a simple date and a small, personal gift are about right. And if you are not sure whether you are official yet, the day is a gentle prompt to talk, not a deadline. Above all, ask what they would like before you plan anything.
It is an awkward bit of timing. The whole holiday assumes a settled couple — set menus for two, cards that say “to my everything” — and you are still learning how they take their coffee. Feeling unsure about how much to do is not overthinking. It is reading the situation correctly.
Valentine’s Day also makes a lot of people take stock of who they really have feelings for, and IF was made for that kind of honesty. It lets you tell someone how you feel, whether you are single or in a relationship and whoever they are, so a feeling you already carry in real life can be acted on when the time is right.
How long have you been dating? A rough guide
- A few dates in. A message on the day is lovely, and nothing more is expected. If you already have a date in the diary that week, there is no need to move it on to the fourteenth.
- About a month. A relaxed plan — a drink, a walk, cooking together — shows you are glad to be seeing them without turning the evening into a declaration.
- Two or three months. A proper date is natural now, with a card or a small gift if you both like the idea.
- Exclusive, or close to it. Celebrate in whatever way suits you both, while remembering that the first Valentine’s of a relationship does not need to be its grandest.
These are guides, not rules. Two people who see each other every day after six weeks are in a different place from two people who have met four times in three months.
Ask before you plan
The easiest way to get Valentine’s Day right is to stop guessing. Hinge’s lead relationship scientist, Logan Ury, suggests a quick “vibe check” in the days before — even a voice note asking how they feel about the day — so you are both working from the same expectations. Her guide also counsels caution about making the fourteenth itself a first date, unless the mood between you clearly suits it.
You can keep it light: “Are we a Valentine’s couple, an anti-Valentine’s couple, or a ‘let’s just get dinner on the fifteenth when it’s cheaper’ couple?” Whatever they answer, you will have learned something about them, and neither of you will be blindsided.
Low-key Valentine’s ideas for a new relationship
Early on, shared experiences tend to beat objects. In a series of experiments, researchers found that gifts of experiences — a concert, a class, a day out — did more to strengthen relationships than material gifts, largely because of the emotions they stir. A few ideas that suit the early weeks:
- Cook something together at one of your places, and keep the playlist half the point.
- Go to a comedy night or a small gig, where the evening has a shape and the conversation has a starting point.
- Take a long evening walk somewhere with lights and end it at a café for something hot.
- Book a class you would both be bad at — pottery, salsa, climbing — and laugh about it.
- Hold your date on the fifteenth instead: quieter restaurants, no set menus, and a private joke about beating the crowds.
- Swap a favourite film each and watch them back to back, with honest reviews.
What to give, if anything
Keep any gift small, personal and matched to where you are. A card with one honest sentence in it — something you genuinely like about them — often means more than anything bought. Flowers or a small treat are fine if they suit the person. Jewellery, big-ticket items and anything that assumes a long future are best saved for later, when they will feel like a celebration rather than a weight.
If you have agreed not to do gifts, believe each other. And if you have both quietly broken the agreement with something tiny, that is usually a good sign.
When one of you cares more about the day
It is common for one person to love Valentine’s Day and the other to find it faintly embarrassing. Neither is wrong, and it is a useful early chance to practise meeting in the middle. If it matters to you, say so simply — “I know it’s a bit cheesy, but I’d love to do something small” — rather than hoping they will guess. If it matters more to them, a little effort costs you very little and tells them you were listening.
If you are not official yet
Valentine’s Day has a way of forcing a question that two people were happily leaving open: what are we? You do not have to answer it on the fourteenth, and the day itself is a poor place to have the conversation. But if it has made you realise you want to be exclusive, it is a perfectly good reason to raise it soon, kindly and in private. When to have the exclusive talk covers how.
Does Valentine’s Day put pressure on a relationship?
It can, though mostly on relationships that were already struggling. Psychologists at Arizona State University tracked couples in the weeks around Valentine’s Day and found that the holiday tended to magnify existing problems rather than create new ones, with no apparent effect on strong relationships or on new ones that were going well. If yours is new and happy, the day is not a test. It is just an ordinary day with better decorations.
If the day has you thinking about someone else
Valentine’s Day is a magnet for what-ifs. You might be seeing someone lovely and still find your mind drifting to a friend, an old flame, or the person you never quite told. That does not make you disloyal or the new relationship a mistake. Feelings keep their own timetable, rarely a convenient one, and noticing them is honest.
If you are single and wondering whether to confess something on the day itself, being single on Valentine’s Day covers exactly that. If you are seeing someone and a crush is on your mind, whether to tell your partner about a crush helps you decide what, if anything, to say.
Where IF fits: a valentine that can wait
Valentine’s Day tells everyone to say how they feel, and never asks whether the timing suits. IF keeps the first half and fixes the second: single, newly attached or in between, you can be honest with whoever is on your mind about a feeling that grew in real life, and act on it when the time comes.
If the person on your mind is the friend, the old flame or the one you never told, send them a valentine that waits: an IF, sealed, 250 characters at most. It might read: “Happy Valentine’s Day from someone who has liked you for longer than is sensible. No card, no pressure. Should we both end up single, dinner on the fifteenth is on me.” On IF, they may be told one has come in, and nothing more: sender and words stay sealed until it opens.
Strange as it sounds on the fourteenth, IF is the dating app that works best for people in relationships. Feelings can sit in an IF, but cannot become a conversation until you are both single: no side flirtation, and no risk to the relationship you are celebrating. Once it is official, switching to in a relationship empties your Likes and chats without deleting your account, so you stay reachable by an IF. A feeling for someone else on Valentine’s Day is normal, and no reason for shame. You are under no obligation to tell anyone you sent an IF, the person you are dating included, and keeping quiet about it is not deceit. Booking dinner for two while secretly dating someone else would be cheating, and lying about it would be wrong.
Sending one costs you nothing the first time; how an IF works explains the rest. If you are happily new, keep the day small and shared, as with the holidays with a new partner. If part of your heart is elsewhere, say so once, sealed, and let the fourteenth be lighter for it.
Questions people ask
Should you celebrate Valentine’s Day after a month of dating?
A small acknowledgement is nice, and a relaxed plan is plenty. Ask how they feel about the day first, and keep anything you do proportionate to a month: a drink, a walk, a home-cooked dinner, rather than a grand gesture.
Is it okay to have a first date on Valentine’s Day?
It can be, if you both find it funny rather than heavy. Many people prefer a first date earlier or later in the week, when restaurants are calmer and the evening carries less symbolism, so it is worth asking which they would rather have.
What do you write in a Valentine’s card for someone new?
Something short, specific and true: a moment you enjoyed, or something you like about them. “I’m really glad I met you” is lovely; declarations of forever can wait.
What if they do not want to celebrate Valentine’s Day?
Take it at face value. Plenty of people dislike the commercial side of it, and that says nothing about how much they like you. Do something ordinary together that week instead, and enjoy not queuing for a table.
Whoever is on your mind this Valentine’s Day, let the feeling be an honest one: put it into IF, and let it be acted on when your timing lines up.