Best and worst MBTI matches? What matters more than type

Search for MBTI compatibility, with queries like “INFP worst match” or “types that clash with ESTJ,” and you will often find charts that color the sixteen types red and blue. If your partner’s or crush’s type sits in a “worst” cell, it can weigh on you for no good reason.

The short answer: MBTI has no scientifically established best match and no worst match. What can be said quite concretely is where two types tend to bump into each other when their letters differ. This guide looks at where the online charts come from, what research on personality and relationship satisfaction says, the friction points for each letter and how to talk them through, and how to read the MBTI compatibility chart and its 136 pair pages.

This site’s compatibility pages give no scores or grades. They show only whether the type profiles often cite a pair as easy to talk with and how many of the four preferences the two share, and leave the rest as material for the two people to talk about.

Most charts circulating online do not say who made them or by what rule. Many of the familiar ones color as ideal the pairs that share how they take in information (S/N) but differ in where they direct energy (E/I) or how they organize life (J/P). That idea comes from interpreting type theory, not from data that followed real couples over time.

This site has similar information. Each type profile lists two or three types it tends to find easy to talk with, and the heart (♥) cells of the chart are the pairs those lists often cite: INFP and ENFJ, INTJ and ENFP or ISTJ and ESFP, for example. Even so, that only means “a starting point where conversation tends to flow,” not that other pairs do not fit.

Interestingly, several of the often-cited pairs differ in three of their four letters: ENTJ and INFP, ENFJ and ISFP, ESTJ and ISFP. Even by this site’s own profiles, the rule “the more letters differ, the worse the match” does not hold.

There is little evidence that MBTI type pairings predict satisfaction in dating or marriage. Personality research has mostly studied “which personalities get along” with scored traits such as the Big Five, and the findings are more consistent than you might expect.

A study of large, nationally representative samples of married couples from Australia, the United Kingdom and Germany (Dyrenforth and colleagues, 2010) found that how similar the two partners’ personalities were explained less than 0.5% of the differences in relationship satisfaction. Your own personality (about 6%) and your partner’s (1–3%) mattered more.

A meta-analysis pooling many studies (Malouff and colleagues, 2010) likewise found that people tended to be more satisfied when their partner was more emotionally stable and higher in agreeableness, conscientiousness and extraversion. In other words, how each person handles emotions and cares for the other matters more than which types met. You can look at these traits with the Big Five test, and the emotional sensitivity and agreeableness pages go further into how they connect to relationships.

Swap “worst” for “where do we tend to bump into each other?” and compatibility becomes far more useful. Here are the scenes that often come up when two people’s letters differ, axis by axis.

Different E/I means different ways of recharging: one gains energy from people, the other recovers alone. Weekend plans can turn into “out again?” versus “staying in again?”, so even on nights out together, agree on when you will leave and respect the time each of you spends apart.

Different S/N means a different focus in conversation: one starts from concrete facts and experience, the other from possibilities and the big picture. When “so when, and how much?” meets “but what does it mean?”, share the ideas fully, then settle together on just one next step at the end.

Different T/F means a different language for conflict: one wants to fix the problem, the other wants the feeling acknowledged first. Simply asking “do you want a solution, or should I just listen?” before you respond to a worry can help cut down hurt.

Different J/P means a different relationship with time and plans: one feels settled once things are decided, the other needs room to breathe. Agree on which plans are fixed and which are left to the moment, and you will both tire less.

Pairs that differ in all four letters are often labeled “worst”: INFP and ESTJ, ENFP and ISTJ, INTJ and ESFP or INFJ and ESTP. These pairs may need more time to understand each other at first. It also means each can naturally take on what the other finds hard: the ESTJ looks after schedules and getting things done, while the INFP is first to notice how people are feeling.

Same-type pairs, by contrast, easily look like the “best.” Two INFPs are often said to think alike, but they also share the same blind spots. If both avoid conflict, problems can simply pile up; if both put off planning, practical matters tend to slide.

Whatever the pair, its compatibility page shows, for each of the four axes, what fits, where friction tends to arise and a habit to try together. Find the cell where your type and the other person’s meet in the compatibility chart and read it together. Seeing which descriptions each of you nods at is itself a good conversation.

First, name the difference. Instead of “why are you like this?”, try “maybe it is our J/P difference.” It turns blame into explanation. Types are most useful not as labels that pin someone down but as a shared language for talking about difference.

Second, write each other a user manual: what you want when you feel hurt, the signal you send when you need time alone, the ways of being shown love that land for you. The love language test and the attachment style test give more direct material for that conversation than MBTI does.

Third, agree on how you repair after a fight. Couples who last are not couples without conflict. Settling in advance on a signal to pause when words get sharp, a time to pick the topic up again and how you apologize can make any type pairing sturdier. Type-by-type dating styles are covered in more depth in MBTI love styles.

Q. What is the worst MBTI match? A. There is no scientifically established worst match. Pairs that differ in all four letters are often called the worst, but that mostly means they may need more time to understand each other; real relationships depend far more on how you talk and how you care for each other.

Q. What is the best MBTI match? A. No pair is best for everyone. The pairs this site’s type profiles often cite as easy to talk with (INFP and ENFJ, for example) may simply have an easier start; that does not guarantee the relationship will go well.

Q. Do two people of the same MBTI type get along well? A. Not necessarily. They often understand each other easily, but they also tend to share the same weak spots. Even within one type, each person’s experiences and habits differ, so in the end how you handle your differences shapes the relationship.

Q. Should we break up if our MBTI match looks bad? A. No: there is no reason to decide a relationship by type alone. MBTI results can change on a retest, and there is little evidence that type pairings predict relationship satisfaction. Why results change is explained in MBTI accuracy.

Ruling someone out from the start because of their type, or telling a partner “it cannot work because you are that type,” is far from what MBTI was made for. The same goes for picking people by type on a blind date or in hiring. People of the same type still differ, and results can change on a retest.

Be just as wary of the opposite, “we are the perfect match, so it is fine,” when it covers up real problems. If put-downs, control or threats keep recurring in a relationship, that is not a type difference but a safety issue. In the US, the National Domestic Violence Hotline answers at 1-800-799-7233; in the UK, the National Domestic Abuse Helpline is 0808 2000 247. If you are in immediate danger, call your local emergency number.

References: Dyrenforth, Kashy, Donnellan & Lucas (2010), Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 99(4); Malouff, Thorsteinsson, Schutte, Bhullar & Rooke (2010), Journal of Research in Personality 44(1).