Watching porn at work? It's apparently the most popular time for it.

A new study from Ofcom reveals this and other UK adult porn habits.
By Anna Iovine  on 
porn game ads clustered together
29 percent of UK adults visited porn sites in May 2023, Ofcom reports. Credit: Bob Al-Greene / Mashable

More UK porn consumers visit adult sites in the morning and afternoon hours — aka during the work day — than any other time, UK communications regulator Ofcom reports.

In its latest Online Nation study into the digital lives of people living in the UK, which drops today, Ofcom reveals this and other findings about people's porn use. While in May 2023 (when this data was collected), more UK adult visitors went to services for porn content during the work day, they spent the most time on these sites between midnight and 8:59 a.m. The average visit per user in the night time hours was 59 minutes, compared to 55 minutes during mornings and afternoons.

Overall, 29 percent of UK adults visited an online service for pornographic content in May 2023, according to Ofcom. Most visitors were men (73 percent), compared to 27 percent of women; this comes out to 10.1 million men and 3.7 million women.

Tube giant Pornhub was the most popular online porn service, reaching 18 percent of online adults that month. Second place was Chaturbate at nine percent, followed by XVideos at eight percent. Pornhub is the top site for all of-age people and both men and women, but variations start from there; erotic fiction site Literotica and video site Redtube are in women's top ten online services for porn content, but not in men's.

More UK adults visited porn sites in May 2023 than May 2022. During the former, the average visit on Pornhub was 52 minutes. Contrast that with Literotica and hentai manga site Nhentai, where the average time spent per visitor was one hour and nine minutes and three hours 42 minutes, respectively. Unlike Pornhub, however, they each reached a much lower percentage of the population: one percent and 0.2 percent, respectively. Overall, time spent on services for porn content was an hour and 56 minutes in May 2023.

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Ofcom found that UK adult internet users spent an average of three hours and 41 minutes online per day in general that month. It's clear that, for a chunk of these users, porn viewing — whether in video, image, or text forms — is part of their internet routine. Head to Ofcom to see other findings from its annual Online Nation report.

Topics Porn

anna iovine, a white woman with curly chin-length brown hair, smiles at the camera
Anna Iovine

Anna Iovine is the sex and relationships reporter at Mashable, where she covers topics ranging from dating apps to pelvic pain. Previously, she was a social editor at VICE and freelanced for publications such as Slate and the Columbia Journalism Review. Follow her on Twitter @annaroseiovine.


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