Dead by Daylight Lobby Approval Guide: How It Works

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Dead by Daylight does not have a screen labelled “lobby approval” — the term is community shorthand for the controls that decide whether five players actually enter a trial. In public matchmaking, approval is automatic: the matchmaking server fills the slots and the trial begins once all five are present and the Survivors have readied up, with no player holding veto power. In Custom (Kill Your Friends) matches, the host holds every approval decision — inviting, kicking, swapping roles, choosing the realm, and pressing start — and nothing happens until they do.

What people mean by “lobby approval”

The phrase gets used for two different systems that behave nothing alike. Public lobbies are run by the matchmaking service: you queue, you get placed, and the only input you have is whether you press the ready button. Custom lobbies are run by a player: the host creates the lobby, invites the people they want, and can remove anyone before the trial starts. If you searched for a lobby approval guide because a lobby would not start, you are almost certainly dealing with the public system, and the fix is about timing and settings rather than permissions.

Worth knowing up front: per the game’s official patch notes, progression now runs to Prestige 100 per character, with Bloodweb character levels capped at 1–50 and perk tiers at 1, 2, and 3. That matters here only because a stalled lobby is dead time you are not spending on progression.

Public lobbies: nobody approves anyone

In public matchmaking there is no host, no kick button, and no vote. The lobby is a 5-slot container — 4 Survivor slots and 1 Killer slot — that the matchmaking server fills on its own. A Survivor party can be up to 4 players; the fifth slot is always a stranger. The trial starts when the slots are full and the ready-up countdown completes. Your only real levers are your role selection before queuing, your cross-play setting, your party size, and whether you actually press ready.

Custom matches: the host’s approval panel

Custom matches are the only place where approval exists as a player action. The host controls the roster, can move players between Survivor and Killer, selects the realm directly rather than relying on Map Offerings, and starts the trial manually. Custom lobbies can also be filled with AI-controlled characters, which is why they are the standard place to test a build without risking Grade progress — custom matches do not count toward your Grade.

Readying up without delays: the order that works

1. Lock your role before you queue. Public matchmaking does not let you swap after the lobby forms, so queuing as Killer when you meant to play Survivor costs you a full lobby cycle. Reason: the role is set at queue time, not at lobby time.
2. Decide your party size deliberately. The Survivor party cap is 4. A four-stack leaves the Killer slot to matchmaking, which can take noticeably longer in low-population regions or off-peak hours than a duo or solo queue. Reason: you have removed the most flexible slot from the pool.
3. Confirm cross-play matches your friends’ setting. If one player has cross-play disabled and the rest do not, the friend simply never appears in the lobby — no error message, just an empty slot. Reason: this is the single most common “the lobby is broken” cause that is not actually broken.
4. Press ready instead of waiting to be carried into a match. Survivors ready individually; the countdown resolves once the lobby is full and the ready state is satisfied. Reason: idling does not speed anything up and can hold a full lobby open longer than necessary.
5. If a slot stays empty for more than a minute or two, back out and re-queue. Reason: matchmaking does not rebalance a stale lobby, and a lobby that has been open a long time tends to stay open. Re-queuing resets you into the active pool.

A worked example of what stalling costs

Say your group plays twelve trials in an evening and a stalled lobby costs you about 40 seconds before someone manually backs out. That is roughly eight minutes of dead time — about two full trials at an average match length, or the equivalent of a full Bloodweb level on a fresh character. Cutting stalls in half is worth more than optimising your perk loadout.

How to kick a player from a lobby

1. Confirm you are in a Custom lobby you created. The kick option does not exist in public matchmaking at all, and a non-host player in a Custom lobby cannot remove anyone. Reason: approval authority belongs to the lobby creator only.
2. Open the lobby player list and select the name. Every occupied slot is listed, including the Killer slot if a second player has taken it. Reason: roles are assigned per slot, so removing the right slot matters if you plan to swap someone in.
3. Choose the remove option and confirm. The player is returned to the main menu and their slot reopens for a replacement invite. Reason: the slot stays reserved for you rather than being handed to a random player, which is the whole point of a Custom lobby.
4. Re-invite before you start. The trial will not begin with an empty slot unless you deliberately fill it with an AI character. Reason: a Custom lobby with a missing slot simply sits there waiting.

Why lobbies stall, and what actually fixes it

• Region and time of day. Population peaks in the evening for your server region; queueing at 6am local will feel like a broken lobby even when nothing is wrong.
• Party size. A four-stack has the fewest available matches. Dropping to three or two often cuts the wait more than any setting change.
• Cross-play mismatch. Covered above — check it before you assume matchmaking is at fault.
• Platform connectivity. A player whose platform connection has dropped out of the lobby will hold a visible slot while being unreachable. Removing and re-inviting them in a Custom lobby, or leaving and re-queuing in public, clears it.
• Host departure in a Custom lobby. If the host leaves, the lobby dissolves entirely for everyone. There is no host migration, so the remaining players have to rebuild it.

Which lobby type fits your situation

Frequently Asked Questions

Does Dead by Daylight have a lobby approval system?

Not by that name. Public matchmaking fills all five slots automatically with no player approval step, and the trial starts once the lobby is full and the ready-up countdown resolves. Approval — inviting, kicking, assigning roles, and starting manually — exists only in Custom (Kill Your Friends) lobbies, where the host makes every decision.

How do I kick someone from my Dead by Daylight lobby?

You can only do it in a Custom lobby you created. Open the lobby player list, select the player’s name, and choose the remove option; they return to the main menu and their slot reopens for a replacement invite. Public matchmaking has no kick function, and a non-host player in a Custom lobby cannot remove anyone.

Why does my lobby take so long to fill?

The usual causes are party size, time of day, region population, and cross-play settings. A four-player Survivor party needs matchmaking to find a Killer, which is the slowest slot to fill in low-population hours, and a cross-play mismatch between friends can leave a slot visibly empty indefinitely. Backing out and re-queuing usually resets a stale lobby faster than waiting.

Can the host change roles in a Custom match?

Yes. In a Custom lobby the host assigns players to the four Survivor slots or the single Killer slot, and can move them between roles before starting. Public matchmaking does not allow this — your role is locked at the moment you queue, not when the lobby forms.

Do you get a penalty for leaving a lobby?

Leaving before the trial begins does not trigger the disconnect penalty in either lobby type. Leaving after the trial has started does, and the matchmaking lockout escalates with repeat offences. Custom matches are generally exempt from the public penalty system.

Can cross-play friends join my Custom lobby?

Yes, provided cross-play is enabled on both sides. The most common failure is one player having cross-play turned off while the others have it on — the invite appears to send but the friend never shows up in the slot. Confirm the setting matches across the whole group before you start troubleshooting anything else.