⚠️This fact has been debunked
Research shows women laugh significantly more than men (126% more in mixed-gender conversations), particularly in social contexts. While men may generate more humor, women are more likely to laugh in response. No consistent evidence supports men laughing louder or longer - acoustic studies show context-dependent results and some findings suggest female laughter is rated as louder.
Men laugh longer, louder, and more often than women.
Do Men Really Laugh More Than Women? The Surprising Truth
If you've heard that men laugh longer, louder, and more often than women, you've been fed a myth. Research consistently shows the opposite: women laugh significantly more than men, especially in social settings.
In studies of mixed-gender conversations, women laughed 126% more than their male counterparts. That's not a small difference—women were literally doubling men's laughter output. And it gets more interesting: women laughed more regardless of whether a man or woman was speaking.
Who's Making the Jokes vs. Who's Laughing
Here's where the confusion might come from: men are more likely to elicit laughter rather than laugh themselves. They focus on being humor producers, cracking jokes and generating laughs from others. Women, meanwhile, are more likely to be humor consumers—laughing at jokes and contributing to the overall levity.
The dynamics shift based on who's in the room. Women talking to other women generated the most laughter of any pairing. Men with men? Only about half as much laughter as women with women.
But What About Volume?
The claim that men laugh louder doesn't hold up either. Acoustic research on laughter shows mixed, context-dependent results:
- Some studies found female laughter rated higher for loudness than male samples
- Other research suggested context matters more than gender—rewarding social situations produce louder laughs regardless of sex
- Male laughter is often characterized by grunts or snorts, while female laughter tends to be more "sing-song"
One fascinating finding: women's laughter averages twice as high-pitched as their normal speech, while men's laughter is 2.5 times higher than their speaking voice.
Why Does This Myth Persist?
The stereotype likely stems from visibility bias. Because men often position themselves as joke-tellers in social settings, their role in humor feels more prominent. We notice the person getting laughs, not necessarily who's doing the most laughing.
There's also the factor of what men and women laugh at. Research indicates men use humor more aggressively and for dominance, while women use it for social bonding. The contexts where laughter happens—and how it's perceived—shape our assumptions about who laughs more.
When researchers actually counted daily laughter incidents across all contexts, men and women didn't differ in total frequency. But in face-to-face social interactions—where we form our impressions—women are the champions of laughter.