So often women think about sex

When asked ‘How often do men think about sex each day?’, most of us have an immediate answer ready. Something like: always, everywhere, and probably even while parking. But if you turn the question around to how often women think about sex, it suddenly becomes remarkably quiet.

And that's quite strange, because newsflash: women have fantasies too. About sex. About touching. About that one message that lingers just a bit too long. About porn, porn or just about pampering themselves without first attaching a TED Talk about shame to it.

In 2026, we can therefore say: women think about sex. Not because they have to, not because someone else thinks something about it, but because desire is simply not a men's hobby.

Daydreaming at work

Now that we've neatly thrown that myth in the trash, let's move on to the big question: how often do women actually think about sex? How many naughty thoughts fly through our heads on average each day while we supposedly stare very professionally at an Excel sheet?

Over the years, various studies have been conducted on this. An old British study from the dating site Dating Direct once cheerfully circulated with the conclusion that women would think about sex about 34 times on a workday. Converted, that's about every 14 minutes. Sounds like a particularly productive office environment, but there was a caveat: the participants were visitors of a dating site, and some of them were not satisfied with their sex lives. Well, then it might not be so strange that during lunch break you mentally drift off to someone who is not sitting next to you chewing on a dry cheese sandwich.

Nice figure, then, but perhaps not the most representative piece of evidence ever. More of one for the category: exciting, juicy, and with a grain of salt.

Sex, eating, or sleeping

A more well-known study from Ohio State University gives a slightly more nuanced picture. Researchers had 283 students aged between 18 and 25 keep track of when they thought about sex, eating, or sleeping for a week. And no, men did not think about sex every seven seconds. Luckily, because then probably nothing would get done at all.

The study showed that young men thought about sex more often on average or median than young women, but the difference was less hysterical than often thought. The university itself mentions a median of almost 19 sexual thoughts per day for men and almost 10 for women. Also notable: men thought almost as often about eating and sleeping. In short, sometimes it's not a lustful thought, but just a craving for a toastie or a need for a nap.

For women, eating even ranked higher than sex in that study. And honestly: we understand that. Sometimes you don't want a wild night, but just fries with mayonnaise, a clean bed, and no one asking “are you angry?” while you're just tired.

So, how often do women think about sex?

The honest answer: it varies greatly. One woman thinks about it several times a day, another occasionally, and yet another especially when a good series, a handsome colleague, or a particularly suggestive pasta commercial comes by. Desire simply cannot be neatly scheduled into a daily planner.

What the research mainly shows is that women have sexual thoughts. Period. Not as an exception, not as a taboo, but simply as part of being human. And how often that happens depends much more on your mood, your relationship, your hormones, your stress level, your sleep deprivation, and your comfort with sexuality than on the simple box of ‘man’ or ‘woman’.

So no, women do not spend the whole day only thinking about shopping lists, work emails, and whether there is enough laundry detergent. Sometimes we think about sex. Sometimes about eating. Sometimes about sleeping. And on a great day, we just combine all three in the perfect order.

Why not kill two birds with one stone? From these summery foods you get your wish with a capital Z.