How long should sex last for? Survey reveals the magic number
While many of us wonder how often we should be having sex, we're also keen to know how long it should ideally last.
While it's important to remember that everyone is different and you need be yourself in the bedroom, it turns out there is a magic number when it comes to the length of time we're getting down to action.
Research by online sex retailer Lovehoney aimed to find out the ideal number of minutes of intimacy people would like to enjoy.
Drumroll… it’s 30 minutes.
Although 40% of people said their ideal sex session would last more than 30 minutes, only 24% said they were actually getting it for that long.
Turns out there's a bit of a difference between how long we're spending between the sheets and how long we might want to be, with almost half of all those polled (47%) saying they were spending 15 minutes getting raunchy.
And for 16% of respondents sex is lasting just 10 minutes.
But according to sexpert Annabelle Knight, people shouldn’t panic if they aren’t currently meeting the "expected" number of intimate minutes.
“Thirty minutes for some people would be way too short, for others, it might be a long time. If you’re both happy with the time you spend having sex, then that’s all that matters,” she told the Daily Mail.
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To reignite the spark, Knight says mixing things up is important. It’s also a good idea to do it as often as you can and try out some new things together.
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As well as uncovering the holy grail of intimate minutes, the research also looked at how often poll participants were having sex as well as when they tended to do it.
Turns out that while half (50%) are getting it on at least once a week, there was no "best time" to do it.
“Some people enjoy sex when they’ve had a drink. Some people are early morning people, others are night owls. The best time is when the two of you are happiest doing it,” Knight explains.
“Aim to connect sexually on a regular basis – that might just mean a sexy kiss or some type of foreplay that doesn’t necessarily go further,” she added.
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The survey comes as further research reveals the cities where singles have gone the longest without sex.
Research by a new dating site called Desperate Dating, found that singles in Bradford have, on average, been single for five years and three months and have spent six years without sex.
Singles in Wakefield have the second-longest dry spell at five years and six months, while single people in Sheffield went for five years and one month without having sex on average.
A separate survey by Superdrug found that the average single person had sex every two months, while the average person in a relationship or married had sex once per week.
However, there were exceptions to these rules as it found that a few of the 1,500 people it surveyed who were single had gone without sex for two decades – one even for 27 years.
