Our Lingo of Love; Weird Irish Dating Terms

Irish people are renowned for our unusual takes on the English language; from our love of the ‘craic’ to calling fizzy drinks ‘minerals’. When it comes to sex and dating, the list of sayings is endless. For a country as small as Ireland, we have a huge range of ways to say you got physical with someone that differ from one county to the next. Here’s your one stop shop for the best Irish slang and expressions for sex, dating and more! 

Shift: a word that is close to the hearts of every Irish person, ‘shift’ is the favoured word for kissing (with tongues). You could be asked to ‘shift my mate’ in pretty much any nightclub in Ireland, along with ‘meet’, ‘get off with’, ‘score’, ‘lob the gob’, ‘pogue’ and ‘wear the face off’. 

Ride: another universal term on the island of Ireland, to ‘ride’ somebody does not mean to sit in a car or hop up on a horse. It means to hop up on another person, AKA sex. While the act of riding is pretty self-explanatory, to call somebody a ride means you think they’re worthy of being ridden; in other words, a ride is a very attractive person. 

Get your hole; Following on from riding, a popular way to describe having sex in Ireland is to say you are ‘getting your hole’. Most commonly used in Dublin, this is a bit cruder than riding, but nonetheless it does the job. 

Beour; I can guarantee that every woman reading this is a ‘beour’, ‘flah’, ‘a bit of talent’ or a ‘fine thing’, also known as an attractive woman. 

Langer: while being ‘langers’ is one of many, many ways Irish people describe being drunk, you’ll often find young lads (mostly from Cork) boasting about the size of their langers. In other words, it means penis. Other words for a man’s langer include ‘willy’, ‘mickey’, ‘knob’, ‘tool’ and ‘cock’. 

Box: while somebody wanting to ‘box’ you is bad news if you don’t want to get punched in the face, ‘box’ also refers to a woman’s vagina. Other ways to describe your private parts include ‘bits’, ‘fanny’, ‘gee’ and ‘growler’.

Mot: For fear of using the word ‘girlfriend’, Irish men have a whole collection of words to describe a significant other, including ‘mot’, ‘bird’, ‘aul doll’ and most simply, ‘the woman’. 

Johnny: you don’t want to be without one of these when you’re riding, a ‘johnny’ is another word for condom. 

In Ireland, we love wordplay and clever analogies, and it is pretty clear that the language of love is ever-growing. While you would be forgiven for mistaking our adaptation of the ‘Queen’s English’ for a completely new language, I hope this guide will help you get lucky on the Emerald Isle!

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• slang