The 36 Questions to Fall in Love (Full List + the Science)

In the 1990s, the psychologist Arthur Aron ran an experiment with a deceptively simple goal: could you make two strangers feel close on purpose, in under an hour? He sat pairs of people down with a list of 36 questions that started light and got steadily more personal, had them take turns answering, and finished with four minutes of silent eye contact. It worked well enough that some of the participants stayed in touch, and at least one pair later married. Years later a New York Times essay (“To Fall in Love With Anyone, Do This”) made the list go viral, and it’s now often called the 36 questions that lead to love.

The questions don’t cast a spell. What they do is engineer something real: escalating, reciprocal self-disclosure.You reveal a little, your partner reveals a little back, and each round goes slightly deeper. That back-and-forth is one of the most reliable ways humans build closeness, and the list just gives it a structure. It works on strangers, and it works just as well on couples who’ve drifted into logistics and want to find each other again.

How to do it

Set aside about 45 minutes. Go through the questions in order, both of you answering each one before moving on (the order matters, because the build-up is the point). Don’t skip ahead to the deep ones. Then, if you’re up for it, finish with the four minutes of eye contact, which feels absurd for about thirty seconds and then doesn’t. The only rule is honesty.

Set I

1. Given the choice of anyone in the world, whom would you want as a dinner guest?
2. Would you like to be famous? In what way?
3. Before making a telephone call, do you ever rehearse what you are going to say? Why?
4. What would constitute a “perfect” day for you?
5. When did you last sing to yourself? To someone else?
6. If you were able to live to 90 and keep either the mind or body of a 30-year-old for the last 60 years of your life, which would you want?
7. Do you have a secret hunch about how you will die?
8. Name three things you and your partner appear to have in common.
9. For what in your life do you feel most grateful?
10. If you could change anything about the way you were raised, what would it be?
11. Take four minutes and tell your partner your life story in as much detail as possible.
12. If you could wake up tomorrow having gained any one quality or ability, what would it be?

Set II

13. If a crystal ball could tell you the truth about yourself, your life, the future, or anything else, what would you want to know?
14. Is there something you’ve dreamed of doing for a long time? Why haven’t you done it?
15. What is the greatest accomplishment of your life?
16. What do you value most in a friendship?
17. What is your most treasured memory?
18. What is your most terrible memory?
19. If you knew that in one year you would die suddenly, would you change anything about the way you are now living? Why?
20. What does friendship mean to you?
21. What roles do love and affection play in your life?
22. Take turns sharing something you consider a positive characteristic of your partner. Share five items total.
23. How close and warm is your family? Do you feel your childhood was happier than most people’s?
24. How do you feel about your relationship with your mother?

Set III

25. Make three true “we” statements each. For instance, “We are both in this room feeling…”
26. Complete this sentence: “I wish I had someone with whom I could share…”
27. If you were going to become a close friend with your partner, what would be important for them to know?
28. Tell your partner what you like about them; be honest, saying things you might not say to someone you’ve just met.
29. Share with your partner an embarrassing moment in your life.
30. When did you last cry in front of another person? By yourself?
31. Tell your partner something you already like about them.
32. What, if anything, is too serious to be joked about?
33. If you were to die this evening with no chance to communicate with anyone, what would you most regret not having told someone? Why haven’t you told them yet?
34. Your house, with everything you own, catches fire. After saving loved ones and pets, you have time to save one last item. What would it be? Why?
35. Of all the people in your family, whose death would you find most disturbing? Why?
36. Share a personal problem and ask your partner’s advice on it. Then ask them to reflect back how you seem to be feeling about it.

What they actually do

It’s worth being honest about the famous headline: the questions don’t guarantee love. What the research actually shows is that they reliably increase closeness— that warm, slightly vulnerable sense of being known. For new couples that can light a spark. For long-together couples, it’s often more valuable: a structured way to get past the logistics and remember the person across the table is still full of answers you haven’t heard.

If asking some of these out loud feels like a lot, that’s normal — the later ones are genuinely exposing. That’s the same problem melt solves with the harder questions about desire: you answer privately, and only the matches are shared. For more in this spirit, our questions to ask your partner and would you rather questions are lighter ways in. But if you have 45 minutes tonight, start at question one and just go.