The Position Most Likely To Make Women Orgasm, According To A New Study

The Position Most Likely To Make Women Orgasm, According To A New Study

The study has some shortcomings, but previous research on orgasms has reached similar findings.

A fun new piece of research sought to unravel the best sex position for heterosexual women when it comes to reaching an orgasm. The study does have some shortcomings, so to speak, but they found that the answer is the good-old-fashioned missionary position (provided there’s a pillow placed under the woman’s butt so their pelvis is slightly raised). 

As reported in the journal Sexologies, a pair of researchers from private gynecology clinic New H Medical in New York assessed the most “successful” position for achieving a female orgasm by looking at blood flow in the clitoris both before and after sex in five positions. 

These positions included face-to-face/female on top, sitting/face-to-face, face-to-face/male on top (with and without pillow), and kneeling/rear entry.

They found that clitoral blood flow increased after engaging in each position except for kneeling/rear entry (aka doggy style). They also discovered that face-to-face/male on top position (aka missionary) with a pillow under the woman’s pelvis was the most successful at sparking clitoral blood flow.

“The kneeling/rear entry position produces the least amount of direct clitoral contact, and resulted in a negligible increase in blood flow compared to the face-to-face positions,” the study authors write. 

Before we go jumping to any conclusions, there are some caveats to consider when looking at these results. First up, the study only involved one heterosexual couple, so there’s certainly no guarantee the results are representative of the wider population. 

The paper explains that the pair were “a healthy medical doctor couple, both 32 years old” who was “well-known to the researchers.” Having sex under the watchful eye of two researchers, it could be argued, isn’t representative of how most people enjoy themselves in bed – but hey, whatever floats your boat.  

There’s also the fact that the study did actually look at whether an orgasm was achieved, it simply assessed the level of blood flow in the clitoris, which is merely suggestive of sexual arousal. 

With those limitations in mind, similar findings have been reached before in large studies. One paper in 2020 surveyed almost 20,000 Czech heterosexual people and asked them about their preference for 13 sexual positions. This also showed that people tended to prefer face-to-face positions when looking for an orgasm, although this found that the favorite of all was face-to-face positions with women on top.