What’s the difference between a boyfriend and a partner?

[misslucy92]

I always thought they were the exact same thing.

are they? why or why not?

Just wondering because in another thread someone said „he’s your boyfriend, not a partner“ and I was like „huh, that’s the same!“.

I personally never liked the term partner. To me it sounds so business-like. A partner can also be a business colleague, a boyfriend is usually someone you’re romantically involved with.

Your thoughts?

I feel like partner is longer. More of a you’d be married but you’re not going to.

I think boyfriend is when you have more separate lives and less joint commitments, you are seeing each other mostly for fun and don’t work on building up joint life.

Boyfriend sounds quite young, not the sort of thing you would say if you were 70, partner is any age or sex

Ir would seem weird to call the father of my children my boyfriend

I have a boyfriend - we've lived together for 28 years. Partner sounds odd to me - we're not married so he's my boyfriend.

If we had a civil partnership he'd be my partner, or married, he'd be my husband.

Partner to me suggests “common law spouse”. Whatever that means (apparently it means nothing).
mom not a big fan of the word either but it’s become so commonplace and does save everyone the indignity of referring to someone’s 63 year old “boyfriend”.

I don’t like the term bf I’m in my 30s and would sound immature so I would say partner but I think people like to point out a bf is someone you don’t live with

*I’m not a big fan (though my mother isn’t either so unintentionally accurate autocorrect)

boyfriend to me is still dating / living separately.
partner is when you are cohabiting / have joint accounts / share a car etc.

Seen it explained on here as dependant on living situation. Living together - partner, not living together - boyfriend

Partner is more committed, so own a home together or both names on the rental agreement, some sort of joint financial arrangements, been together for years & both intending to stay together long term.

Boyfriend is dating, partner is committed relationship (joint goals, long term plans, possibly shared finances, possibly children or well thought out and discussed plans for children).

Boyfriend is “now”, partner is “into the future”.

Boyfriend is “still making up your mind”, partner is “long term strategy”.

Thanks so far.

I know people in their 20s who don’t live together and say partner and people who do live together and have kids and say boyfriend.

i never thought there was a difference.

Partner has always seemed a bit cringe to me. The only time I've ever heard it used in a romantic way is on Jeremy Kyle! I think boyfriend is fine.

I'd say a partner you live with and a boyfriend you date.

I've been with my partner for 8 years. We have a cat, mortgage and baby together. We're also in our 30s. We're engaged but wedding got postponed by covid so can't be arsed to marry at the moment.

I'd say he stopped being my boyfriend when we bought a house together, which coincided with the start of our 30s and shared cat ownership

I think of partner as meaning life-partner so a relationship like living together.

Like, I've been with my boyfriend for a long time, but I wouldn't call him a partner because we live quite separate lives. Even though he's no boy and I'm no girl 😂

I find it really weird when someone says partner, and it turns out they've only been with them a short time and don't live together or anything.

We would say boyfriend/girlfriend for the first few years, now mainly use partner. I suppose it’s thought of as a term used in a more long term committed relationship. We wouldn’t care if someone referred to us as the others boyfriend/girlfriend though as it’s not really important to us, just probably sounds a bit silly to us after almost 25 years and being in our 40s.

This is my definition too…

although I do understand why older people might prefer to say partner - girl/boyfriend does sound very young.
I have a widowed neighbour in his 80s who regularly stays overnight and goes away with his ‘ladyfriend’ and I believe she calls him her ‘gentleman friend’ 😄

Labels aren’t really important but it would be simpler if we could all agree on a definition

And likewise the distinction between girl/boyfriend and just ‘dating’. I assume that dating doesn’t necessarily mean exclusive, or serious? But it does seem to vary between couples

Is about how you percieve them.
Partner is just that, your partner in life. So an expectation of a future together with shared plans and goals, aspects of life that you share such as a home, children, finances, though not necessarily all of them. A general understanding that you are part of a pair.
A boy/girl friend is basically the same as a friend but with a romantic/sexual element, spend time together, support and care for each other, love each other even, but you're not intertwined in the same way as a partner.
Relationships start with the latter and may progress to the former. Some people on MN have strong views about how long that should take and what it entails and have a tendancy to downgrade people's relationships from DP to BF for some reason.

I don't think there is a difference m, really. Maybe some people feel one defines a longer more serious type relationship? But really, I'd say they were the same

Boyfriend\girlfriend lives separately. Partners live together.

Okay😅

To me a partner is someone you share a business with.

As a romantic term I find it very cold and technical. But I guess that’s just me.

i understand everyone’s different.

Partner in my mind implies shared something: finances, home or children- otherwise boyfriend

I've never had a partner, plenty of boyfriends and a husband. Partner sounds like a business arrangement. I hate it when I hear people in their twenties say this, boyfriends sound like much more fun.