The 4 Most Popular BDSM Fantasies

BDSM fantasies are extremely popular, for men and women.

We know this because of the mass popularity of fetish porn, attendance at fetish films and festivals, sales of fetish materials, subscriptions and participation on fetish erotica and chat sites.

People have BDSM fantasies and want to share them, explore them, and learn more about the BDSM fantasies of others.

Fifty Shades of Grey, by E. L. James, is huge evidence of this fact!

While this 2011 novel is a work of fiction, not a study, its surprising and enormous popularity shows at the very least, a huge curiosity towards BDSM among women.

The initially self-published novel about a woman who submits completely to a sexually dominant male sold 150 million copies and counting, and was translated into 52 languages.

Read: 12 Kinky Books About BDSM and Kink

BDSM Fantasies Studies

Unfortunately, it is very difficult to get good statistics on BDSM fantasies.  Studies on BDSM fantasies are sorely lacking. Most of them have been quite broad. For example, the stats we show on BDSM fantasies below are all about domination or bondage. 

I want to know the nitty gritty stuff, like how many of us have hardcore humiliation fantasies, and of those what are their most common BDSM humiliation fantasies? And if they have recurring BDSM fantasies about pissing their pants or being caned, which of those people enjoy that play in real life? 

I want to see stats on who dreams of head-to-toe latex, being wrapped up like a mummy, or being the gainer submissive in a 24/7 feederism fetish relationship.

But unfortunately, the kind of BDSM fantasy information I’m looking for is hard to come by. It’s one thing to see that countless kink lovers are on various fetish boards talking about becoming human furniture or anal training. It’s another to get good statistics about BDSM fantasies, BDSM expression in real life, and everything in between.

We hope that there are more useful and specific statistics available some day. For now, let this suffice—BDSM fantasies in general, such as spanking, domination, and bondage, are so common and widespread it is pretty much accurate to say that almost everyone fantasizes about BDSM.

Read: First Time BDSM Stories: Readers Share Their Experiences

4 Most Popular BDSM Fantasies

1. Spanking Fantasy

Spanking is consistently mentioned in various lists and studies of sexual fantasies as a high ranking fantasy by men and women.

The idea of being spanked gives a fun and naughty flavor to sex, as Madonna sang coyly in “Hanky Panky” in the film Dick Tracy, “Nothing like a good spanky…”

Spanking also allows us to play with and explore power exchange dynamics. It mixes a bit of pain or intensity of sensation with pleasure, without getting too extreme.

Spanking can be more hardcore—caning, paddling, and extreme spanking can deliver an intense level of pain. But light spanking can be tingly or sting without any real suffering. This makes spanking an all around versatile way to play that allows kinky exploration with a level of control.

Read: BDSM Spanking: 10 Types of Spankings for Pain and Pleasure

Dr. Justin Lehmiller quotes a 2014 study. “44% of men and 24% of women report fantasies about spanking or whipping someone else during sex, and 36% of women and 29% of men report fantasies about being spanked or whipped.”

Read: 3 Sex Fantasies that Are More Common than You Think

Other studies show that 70% of women and 61% enjoy being spanked.

Almost 96% of people who identify as kinky list spanking as something they enjoy, so those percentages reflect “all” people.

Read: Do Women Like To Be Spanked? [2024 Statistics & Figures]

2. Domination Fantasy

Dr. Justin Lehmiller, is best known for his book and study, Tell Me What You Want. He collected data from over 4000 people about erotic fantasies and BDSM fantasies.

Lehmiller found that BDSM fantasies were extremely common to everyone. Interestingly, most people fantasized on both sides—dominance and submission. 

93% of women and 81% of men fantasized about being sexually dominated.

85% of men and 76% of women fantasized about dominating someone else.

Read: BDSM Submissives: 16 Types of Subs

When understanding sexual fantasies, it is interesting to note that all of us have fantasies that we want to explore for real, that we don’t want to explore in real life, and that we aren’t yet sure we want to try or not.

Fantasizing, including BDSM fantasies, is a way of processing and trying on different roles and scenarios and ideas.

Read: The BDSM Dom: 16 Types of Dominants in BDSM

3. Bondage Fantasy

The “3 Sex Fantasies” study showed that the vast majority of men and women had also fantasized about bondage, specifically, BDSM fantasies about being tied up or tying someone up during sex.

This meant 85% of 73% of men.

Read: Bondage Ideas: 10 Types of Bondage Play

4. Rape Fantasy

Rape is not BDSM at all, of course, because the whole deal with BDSM is that we each have autonomy over our desires and preferences. Liberation and consent go hand in hand, so we can safely explore our darkest and wildest sides—by our own choice. And rape by definition is being forced against our will to have sex.

Rape fantasies, however, could qualify as BDSM fantasies, because in a fantasy, we are in charge. Rape fantasies could play into consensual non-consent (CNC) kinks, into the idea of submission and domination and the power exchange dynamics that we explore in kink.

Read: Should You Indulge Your Kinky Date’s Rape Fantasy?

Rape fantasies are enormously popular and common. It is always surprising how big the numbers are when one or another study or survey is released. 

For example, in 2012, a study reported that 62% of women surveyed had rape fantasies.

This number held up almost exactly when in 2018 Dr. Lehmiller surveyed over 4000 people and found that 66% of the women had rape fantasies.

Read: Understanding and Indulging in Rape Fantasies

While some people who are ignorant of psychology and can’t tell the difference between fantasy and reality have made much ado about nothing in regards to repeated indications that women fantasize about being overpowered, ravished, abducted, surprised, or forced into sex, it’s interesting that men also fantasize about being raped. In fact, the numbers are higher.

In 1980, almost 46% of men reported fantasizing about being forced into sex by a woman. Jump ahead to 2018 and the numbers hold up in a different context, that big study by Dr. Lehmiller, with 54% of men having fantasies about being raped by women.

Read: Femdom Ideas: 38 Ways to Dominate Him

Sexuality Statistics

While BDSM fantasy statistics are hard to find, there are studies on fetishes, kinks, sexual acts, and sexual orientations, and Sexual Alpha has a great repository available by various themes.

Read: What Are The World’s Most Common Fetishes And Kinks? [2024 Data]

For example, this particular article gives a lot of statistical information that is related to BDSM fantasies, but is more about who tried what or who is into what, and what different regional areas search for online. 

I was surprised to see random fascinating tidbits such as Alaska’s fetish of choice is fisting, and Idaho’s is E-stim.

You can get an overview into people’s BDSM fantasies and experiences.

What is your top BDSM fantasies? Dare to share with readers!