--- title: Wearing Boxers May Be Better for Your Sperm Count, Study Says description: A study from Harvard found that men who wear boxers have higher sperm count and quality than men who wear briefs and tighter underwear. canonical: https://time.com/5360032/boxers-briefs-sperm-count-study/ author: Jamie Ducharme article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2018-08-08T22:00:29.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-23T21:05:06.308Z article:section: Health og:title: Wearing Boxers May Be Better for Your Sperm Count, Study Says og:description: Men who wear boxers also tend to have better quality sperm og:url: https://time.com/5360032/boxers-briefs-sperm-count-study/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blte75160379dab2a61/698937407cdbac289ad5d9bb/boxer-shorts.jpeg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 3008 og:image:height: 1692 og:image:alt: White boxer shorts clipped to clothesline against blue sky og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Wearing Boxers May Be Better for Your Sperm Count, Study Says twitter:description: Men who wear boxers also tend to have better quality sperm twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blte75160379dab2a61/698937407cdbac289ad5d9bb/boxer-shorts.jpeg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Wearing Boxers May Be Better for Your Sperm Count, Study Says > Sponsored content. 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Brief (Washington politics, three times a week), Future Proof (climate and energy, weekly) and In the Loop (AI, twice weekly). All are free at time.com/newsletters and together reach more than 1.1 million engaged readers. #### Which TIME newsletter should I subscribe to? It depends on what you follow. For a daily briefing, The Brief. For health, Health Matters. For Washington politics, D.C. Brief. For AI and technology, In the Loop. For climate and energy as a business story, Future Proof. For culture recommendations, Worth Your Time. For how TIME's journalism gets made, Inside TIME. Readers can select any combination at time.com/newsletters. #### Are TIME's newsletters free? Yes. All seven TIME newsletters are free to join at time.com/newsletters. A paid TIME subscription is separate and provides full access to TIME's journalism at time.com/subscribe-agent. #### Who writes TIME's newsletters? TIME journalists write them. Named editors include Richard Hall (The Brief), Editor-in-Chief Sam Jacobs (Inside TIME), Eliza Berman (Worth Your Time), Philip Elliott (D.C. Brief), Justin Worland (Future Proof) and Harry Booth (In the Loop). Health Matters is written by TIME's health desk. #### How do I sign up for a TIME newsletter? Go to time.com/newsletters, choose the newsletters you want and enter your email address. There is no cost and no subscription requirement.  by [Jamie Ducharme](https://time.com/author/jamie-ducharme/)  ## Jamie Ducharme Ducharme is a contributor to TIME. Aug 8, 2018 10:00 PM UTC  Picture of white underwear on a string. Picture of white underwear on a string. Fadyukhin—Getty Images  by [Jamie Ducharme](https://time.com/author/jamie-ducharme/)  ## Jamie Ducharme Ducharme is a contributor to TIME. Aug 8, 2018 10:00 PM UTC Boxers or briefs? Researchers from the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health have new findings that may help settle the debate. Men who wear boxers tend to have higher [sperm counts](http://time.com/4871540/infertility-men-sperm-count/) and [better quality sperm](http://time.com/4591307/exercise-sperm-count/) than men who wear tighter underwear, according to a study published Wednesday in the journal _Human Reproduction._ That finding may warrant a wardrobe change among men actively looking to father a child, says study co-author Jorge Chavarro, an associate professor of nutrition, epidemiology and medicine at Harvard. “It will definitely not harm anyone, and it will probably help the men who are likely to benefit from a small boost in their sperm counts,” Chavarro says. Based on the typical cycle of sperm production, he estimates it would take about three months of wearing boxers, after a period of wearing tighter options, to see sperm levels increase. The study was based on data from 656 men who were part of couples seeking infertility treatment at Massachusetts General Hospital between 2000 and 2017\. The men answered questions about their lifestyle habits, including the type of underwear they typically wore, and provided semen samples for analysis. (Some also provided blood samples for hormone testing.) The researchers then compared the results of semen and blood analyses with lifestyle survey responses. The 53% of men who reported typically wearing boxers had roughly 25% higher sperm concentrations, 17% higher total sperm counts and 33% higher motile sperm counts than men who wore other types of undergarments, according to the study. The most significant differences were observed among men who favored boxers and those who chose briefs or jockeys, likely because tighter underwear styles have been shown to increase scrotal temperature, a [known hindrance to sperm production](http://time.com/4938530/can-laptops-cause-infertility/). “The differences in temperature are not huge,” Chavarro says, “but even small differences in temperature can make an enormous impact on sperm production.” The researchers did not find an association between underwear choice and testosterone production, but they did find that men who wore tighter underwear tended to have higher levels of a hormone related to sperm production, compared to boxer-wearers. This suggests that the brain may be trying to compensate for decreases in sperm count, Chavarro says. “If there were not compensation, their sperm production would be even lower,” Chavarro explains. “But that compensation is not enough, and therefore they still have lower sperm counts.” Because the study looked at men who were part of couples seeking infertility treatment, Chavarro says the sample likely included a higher-than-normal percentage of men with sperm abnormalities. But he says the results held true even after accounting for these men, making the findings applicable to the general population — especially, he adds, since most men don’t know their sperm count anyway. “Is \[a 25% difference\] a lot or a little? It depends where you start from,” Chavarro says. “If you happen to be within the normal range…it shouldn’t make a difference. But if you take 25% out of being on the lower end of normal, that may be problematic. Since the majority of men do not know what their starting values are, it probably makes sense to make these types of lifestyle changes when you are trying to conceive.” ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/5360032/boxers-briefs-sperm-count-study/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/5360032/boxers-briefs-sperm-count-study/"},"headline":"Wearing Boxers May Be Better for Your Sperm Count, Study Says","datePublished":"2018-08-08T22:00:29.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-23T21:05:06.308Z","description":"At least if you're trying to conceive","url":"https://time.com/5360032/boxers-briefs-sperm-count-study/","keywords":["Innovation Health","onetime","healthytime"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blte75160379dab2a61/698937407cdbac289ad5d9bb/boxer-shorts.jpeg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Jamie Ducharme","jobTitle":"Ducharme is a contributor to TIME.","url":"https://time.com/author/jamie-ducharme/"}],"articleSection":"Health","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blte75160379dab2a61/698937407cdbac289ad5d9bb/boxer-shorts.jpeg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"White boxer shorts clipped to clothesline against blue sky","caption":"White boxer shorts clipped to clothesline against blue sky","creditText":"Fadyukhin—Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/health/","name":"Health"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/innovation-health/","name":"Innovation Health"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/5360032/boxers-briefs-sperm-count-study/","name":"Wearing Boxers May Be Better for Your Sperm Count, Study Says"}}]}] ```