20-Year Survey Reveals Women’s Porn Preferences, Habits

This year marks the twentieth anniversary of Sssh.com, a female-led, female-focused ethical adult website and film studio. That makes Sssh.com one of the oldest adult websites—and certainly one of the oldest adult websites aimed at women. Founder and director Angie Rowntree says she knew that her work was different from the very beginning, and decided to take it a step further by involving her viewers in the process of creating groundbreaking adult content.

So, twenty years ago, Rowntree began conducting an ongoing survey that asked her site’s members about their likes, dislikes, viewing habits, and more. The result is a twenty-year-long snapshot of the preferences of 30,000 porn viewers, 82% of whom are women. And Rowntree has turned some of the results into a fascinating infographic (embedded below) to teach the masses about what these female porn fans really like, how and when they watch, and what they want more of.

First of all, let’s get something straight right away: The women of Sssh.com watch porn way more than you might think.

Of the 30,000 survey respondents, a full 35% report taking in adult entertainment a few times a week, and a further 14% take in smut every day. And those women are watching it for pleasure more than anything else—25% of respondents reported that their primary motivation for watching porn was to orgasm. (Though another 16% admitted to watching porn out of curiosity, and 15% just watched when they were bored, we bet that many of those viewing sessions ended in orgasms anyway!) That makes sense, since only a tenth of respondents tend to watch porn with a partner more than half the time.

These viewers also valued storyline in their porn, but perhaps not as much as dominant narratives about women’s preferences would have us believe: Only 16% of respondents called the story “very important” to their enjoyment of porn, while nearly half (45%) said it was “somewhat important.”

What is important for women viewers at Sssh.com, apparently, is female-focused foreplay, which ranked number one on the list of turn-ons for female survey respondents, followed by sex toys, cunnilingus, BDSM, and rough sex. Conversely, those same female viewers were grossed out by facials and other cumshots, as well as anal sex, close-ups of penetration, and, interestingly, rough sex—which showed up on both the turn-ons and turn-offs lists! We guess it just goes to show that not all women want the same thing, and that porn preferences are as individual as the viewer.