Everything You Want to Know About Female Ejaculation

Female ejaculation has something of a mythical reputation. Everyone has questions: Can a vagina actually ejaculate like a penis? If it can, is that even normal? And what comes out, anyway? To get answers, we reached out to sex experts, who separated fact from fiction.

What Is Female Ejaculation?

Female ejaculation – which is sometimes colloquially known as squirting – involves the expulsion of fluid from the urethra during sex. However, an exact definition of vaginal ejaculation is hard to come by. 

Some studies distinguish female ejaculation from squirting by defining ejaculate as a secretion of fluid from the Skene’s glands — “the female prostate” — that surrounds the urethra, and defining squirting as a larger expulsion of liquid from the bladder which more closely resembles urine.

Female ejaculation is surprisingly more common than you might think, but the exact numbers are tricky to nail down because of how differently people have defined it. Some people define it as:

• Vaginal lubrication
• Squirting
• Coital incontinence

Generally speaking though, mostly in conversation, the terms are used interchangeably and simply refer to any expulsion of liquid from the vaginal opening or urethra during sex.

Is Female Ejaculation Actually Urine?

The answer is tricky. The first major study that looked into squirting back in 2014 determined the liquid was pee. Researchers found urea, creatinine, and uric acid concentrations — all major components of urine — in the excretions of all seven study participants. (Keep in mind that's a tiny sample size, and it's hardly considered representative of half the world's population).

But the ejaculate is also not pee. Sometimes it’s a milky fluid and researchers think what distinguishes the two might be where it comes from. 

What Does Female Ejaculation Come From? 

With all that in mind, for some people, female ejaculate is a thick, whitish fluid resembling diluted milk, that’s usually “clear as water.” This fluid contains some of the same components as semen, such as prostate-specific antigen and prostatic acid phosphatase. It also contains some of urine’s primary components: creatine and urea. This kind of female ejaculation comes from the Skene’s glands, or “the female prostate,” near the urethra at the G-spot.

Some other research indicates female ejaculate comes from the bladder and some women even report that the sensation is akin to urinating for them.

Can All Women Ejaculate?

Studies show that only 10% to 50% of women experience "involuntary ejaculation," according to the International Society for Sexual Medicine.

“Because we don't know how this expulsion is triggered, it's impossible to know at this time whether some women may be more or less prone to experience it," Nicole Prause, a sex researcher at UCLA, told Health. Like the vaginal orgasm, vaginal ejaculation relies on a number of factors including the kind of stimulation you’re experiencing, your anatomy, and your state of mind during sex.

With that said, it looks like G-spot stimulation is commonly associated with vaginal ejaculation or squirting so if you’re interested in experimenting, that is a good place to start.

Lastly, as novel as the idea of female ejaculation or squirting may seem, remember that no research has linked female ejaculation to better sex. Your pleasure in bed definitely doesn't depend on your ability to ejaculate or not.

 At the very least, you'll get a lot of pleasure out of experimenting and you might discover a new way to give yourself or your partner pleasure.