25 Mix-and-Match Date Ideas

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Date ideasI love the idea of dating, even when a relationship is established. The Bloke and I have been together for six years, but we still enjoy planning and going on date nights – mainly because it gives us purposeful time to spend together and something special to look forward to.

The following list is a set of ideas that can be mixed and matched together to suit you and your own tastes, and don’t involve Netflix (or chill). They don’t have to involve spending a lot of money, or be done during the evenings – many are perfect for during the day too!

1. Find the recipes for your favourite foods and create a formal, three course meal from scratch (with advanced planning, ingredients can be obtained from low-cost supermarkets and farmers markets). Put on some nice music, light some candles and turn off your phones.

2. Build a (safe) fire in the back yard, snuggle up under some blankets and roast some marshmallows.

3. Go for an unplanned drive until you find something interesting (but take your sat nav or a map just in case!)

4. Create a homemade spa, complete with a bubble bath, face masks, pedicures and nice-smelling oils for massages. Treat each other.

5. Buy a selection of food from the local market, create a picnic and eat it while sitting on blankets in the park.

6. Go to a flea market or vintage market, give yourselves a budget of £5.00 each and see who can find the best item for that amount or less.

7. Find a local pub quiz and enter it as a couple. Create a witty team name.

8. Go for a walk without direction or purpose. Just walk. Hold hands while doing so.

9. Choose a film that you haven’t seen in a long time, then watch it while eating your favourite snacks.

10. Find an interesting view, or great architecture, or colourful graffiti and take pictures with your cameras.

11. Go out just for dessert and a cocktail.

12. Participate in a Colour Run, or a Zombie Walk.

13. Choose a town or city that you have never been to and visit for the day. You can save money on cheap travel fare if you book specific tickets in advance, and you could create a list of unusual things to see and do while you’re there.

14. Games night. Whether it’s just the two of you, or as part of a double date with another couple, many happy hours can be spent playing retro board games. The Bloke and I once had a game of Monopoly that lasted about three hours. I won.

15. Exercise. Swim, run, play badminton or tennis, go to the gym, attend a yoga class. Work up a sweat together and enjoy the endorphin rush. Many places offer introductory sporting sessions and taster classes.

16. Look for different festivals/outdoor cinema screenings/museum exhibitions in your local area. There are often opportunities for free or discounted tickets if you go at specified times.

17. Re-watch an old TV series from the beginning. The Bloke and I have done this with Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and will do this at some point with Californication and Chuck.

18. Surprise your partner. Give them no information other than what they should wear, and then take them to see a musical, or a play, or out for a nice meal.

19. Give each other a makeover. There’s lots of YouTube videos of couples doing each other’s make-up, and it’s a lot more fun than it sounds!

20. Attend a launch/tester night for a new cocktail bar or restaurant. The Bloke and I love doing this, and having a blog certainly helps with securing invites! However, even if you don’t have one, you can contact owners and event planners via Twitter or Facebook.

21. Go to a local comedy night. Some comedy clubs have cheap tickets for nights that host amateurs, or professionals that are trying out new material for research.

22. If you’re lucky enough to live near the beach, spend the day laying around in the sand. If there’s a pier, waste some small change in the slot machines. Nothing more exciting than 2p machines.

23. Take a class together – art, cooking, photography, writing, dance… Find a mutual interest and indulge in it together.

24. For those of you that enjoy singing, go to karaoke, or an open mic night.

25. Go to your local library and choose a book for each other that you think you’ll both enjoy.

What about you guys? Have you got any interesting date ideas? What’s the best date you’ve ever been on?

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108 thoughts on “25 Mix-and-Match Date Ideas”

  3. Some really lovely date ideas here! Number 2 is cute! ❤️ I often struggle to come up with good date night ideas, we tend to fall into the same old routine. I’ll try some of these and I’ll report back 🙂

  4. These are great! My husband and I have a lot of fun cooking together. We rarely go out to eat, between the two of us we can cook almost everything.

  5. Know of a young couple who once a month go on date night, currently working through the alphabet, place, food & activity ie Aberdeen, apple sourz & arts.They post it on Instagram and it looks so lovely the thought they put into it.

    • Oh wow. I really really love this idea! We try to plan weekly date nights but they usually fall apart as life gets in the way, but monthly might be a bit more doable. The alphabet plan is super fun and cool 🙂

  7. It’s a good idea to earmark time to spend together. Not that I’ve ever done it, mind you, but it’s a good idea 🙂

  12. We don’t go out often but we date at home. Movie night, meals we cook for each other. Just being together. Kids included and sometimes they sneak off to give us some time. I think it’s amazing of them that they realize we happily take a moment or two just the two of us. Love your list!

  13. Fab ideas. We do a lot of these. As time permits, we try to duck out for a drink and dessert. Also, I’ve lost count of how many times we’ve watched Buffy. 🙂

  15. Love these ideas! July 2017 will be the 30 year mark for hubby and I being together (October 2019 will be the 30th wedding anniversary), and we’ve done a number of these. Years ago, a (sadly) short lived business popped up in our area called, “Room Service.” You called and placed your order, then a delivery person wearing typical high class restaurant garb (black pants, white shirt kind of stuff) showed up, set your table, and unpacked the food for you. We splurged for Valentine’s Day that year, and it was lovely, but extremely expensive (and by the time all was said and done, the food was cold).

    Oh, and I’d add in to the library idea that reading aloud to each other is pretty cool as well. 🙂

  17. Love these ideas! My husband would love the one where we just get in our vehicle and drive. He’s always wanting to take weird routes and meander. I’m usually the one telling him to just get to where we’re going. lol I’ll have to suggest this one, he’ll love it. Thanks for the ideas!

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  19. I have been with boyfriend for over 4 years, I can’t remember the last time we went on a ‘date’! I love how all your ideas don’t cost mush money or none at all 🙂

  20. Loved these. Done them. Will do again. Back when we first moved up, Neil and I waited for Isla to sleep and then we sat outside the front door looking at the stars for hours.

  22. These are great ideas. My husband and I have been married 26 years and we still enjoy going out on dates, but we sometimes get in a rut of eating out as our main activity. Last week as we finished our meal I suggested we see if there were play tickets available at our local theater and even though we were 15minutes late we had a blast seeing ‘The Full Monty.’ It was so fun to change things up and do something spontaneous.

  24. This is wonderful and I’m so happy you have such a wonderful relationship. You are so lucky. There’s a few here that I think are really wonderful, let’s see how it goes down with a 20 year relationship 😉

  26. Love these ideas! Especially the zombie walk. Is that an arranged thing? Like are other people involved? Or do you just go out and pretend to be a zombie (*pictures the scene in Shaun of the Dead where they all practise acting like a zombie*)?

  28. Love some of these ideas. This will make me sound like a total geek, but a “date night” that we do is puzzle night! We do a puzzle whilst drinking gin & eating crap and genuinely have a great time! You can chat whilst you do it, so it’s always nice. We have no babysitters available so we have to find our entertainment where we can haha x

  31. You can tell I’m a bloke – I’d never have thought of any of them. Only been married for 18 months too! Shame on me. I do find though that the best times tend to happen spontaneously, so some of the less ‘planned’ ideas would work for me 😀

  33. I’ve read the list before, but enjoyed being reminded of a few choice bits. One activity my husband and i recently discovered we like to do together is putting together a puzzle! I know it’s super nerdy, but its fun!

  36. These are such great ideas! I’ve become terrible at planning. Usually, on a Friday night, Danny and I look at each other and ask, “You want to go to the mountains?” Ha! We are so last minute.

  42. Awww 😍 I have hearts in my eyes! I think my guy and I need to spend more *quality* time together and these ideas are great. I especially like the library one and the market/picnic one too. Have bookmarked – THANK YOU :).

  43. Out of the 25 date ideas, my husband and I have tried 5 of them. I love the ideas that you have listed! We have been so busy for the past couple of months that we haven’t had any time for us. I think I’m going to try the unplanned drive next. Sounds like an adventure right up our alley. Thanks!!! 😊🚗

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