10 First Kiss Tips To Make Sure Your Nervous Lips Don't Ruin Everything

Ahh, the first kiss. It’s one of life’s sweetest moments — but if you don’t plan and execute it correctly, it can be an acutely embarrassing experience. Pulling off a great first kiss can be the difference between scoring yourself a second date and being ghosted the next time you send a tentative, “Hey, how’s it going?” text. So how do you make sure you get it right? Here are the top 10 first kiss tips:

1. Be Sure Your Date Wants To Kiss You

You can’t kiss someone who doesn’t want to kiss you back, so make sure your date has demonstrated a clear interest in you. Use your judgment here: If you’ve been getting along really well, you’re sitting somewhere romantic, she’s touching her hair, giggling at all your jokes and patting you fondly on the arm… well, kiss her. That’s your moment. You could ask directly — “Would it be OK if I kissed you?” — but many women report being turned off by this question, and would prefer you exercised judgment and took control. Read the individual situation and make sure you act respectfully, but forthrightly.

2. Make Sure Your Breath Is Fresh

Fresh breath is a very basic requirement for any kiss, let alone the first with a new person. You should be exercising good oral hygiene all year round, and not only on the night of your date (that is, brushing your teeth twice a day and flossing daily, just like your dentist told you to.) If you know you have a date lined up and a first kiss might be on the cards, skip the raw onions and cigarettes in the preceding hours. (Maybe skip cigarettes in general? They’re bad for you.)

3. Set The Scene

You don’t want your first kiss to take place in a noisy, messy setting, and you probably don’t want it to be somewhere too brightly lit or conspicuous, either. Consider whether you will be locking lips in front of an audience and ask yourself, “Is it appropriate to kiss here?” A crowded bar or dance floor is fine, but if you’re in a low-key environment or surrounded by small children, it might not be the best place to suck on each other’s faces. Consider others around you and their reasonable aversion to PDA, plus the comfort level of your date. A low-lit, quiet and romantic setting is your best bet here.

4. Smell Good

We’ve already covered the topic of fresh breath, but to secure a great first kiss it’s important to consider how the rest of you is smelling, too. You’re going to be in close proximity to another person, so sweatiness or B.O. will be seriously off-putting for your date. On the flip side, smelling like a well-selected cologne or of fresh soap will make your date swoon. Kissing is not just a tactile experience, it’s an olfactory one too; so make sure you have all her senses soaring (in a good way!)

5. Position Yourself Strategically

Unless you’re sitting close to your date and facing towards her, you’re making the approach unnecessarily hard for yourself. You don’t want to be leaning in from 3 feet away or surprising her with a kiss she isn’t sure is coming, so give her a hint of your intentions by sidling up close and touching her hand or lower back in anticipation — once you’ve received clear signals to proceed, of course.

6. Approach Smoothly

A clumsy or over-forceful lean in could spoil the kiss before it has even started, so try to make your approach as smooth as possible. In the movie Hitch, Will Smith’s character advocates the 90/10 Rule: you lean in 90% of the way when initiating the first kiss, and wait for her to meet your lips by making up the remaining 10%. In real life, of course, there are no hard and fast rules, but the 90/10 rule is a useful guideline; encouraging you to take charge of the situation while still allowing your date some input and agency.

7. Use Your Hands

Your hands are an important tool for elevating your first kiss from mediocre to memorable. They shouldn’t be hanging limply while you are kissing: You might cup her face, hold hands or graze her thigh or lower back, depending on the level of intimacy you want to create. Err on the side of tentative touching than full on groping, and give her space to touch you back, too.

8. Go Easy On The Tongue

Too much tongue is an oft-reported kissing turnoff for women. A great first kiss will involve mostly lip-to-lip contact, and, when you do decide to reveal it, your tongue should be tentatively probing hers rather than swishing around her mouth or repeatedly darting in and out of it. Control your level of saliva, too — there are few things less appealing than someone else’s drool in your mouth.

9. Time The Kiss Right

“How long should a kiss be?” is like asking, “how long is a piece of string?”, but ideally a first kiss shouldn’t go on and on for eternity. If both of you want to make out for a solid 10 minutes that’s up to you, but generally a relatively short session will be comfortable and appropriate, and build anticipation for a second kiss.

10. Consider Your Follow-Up

Success! You landed a first kiss. Now what? Don’t just sit there in silence like a shell-shocked teen who can’t believe his luck. The immediate aftermath of a first kiss is potentially awkward territory, and the best thing you can do to diffuse the moment is say something. “I’ve been wanting to do that for ages” is a slightly cliche but flattering line, or you could use the post-kiss lull to land a genuine compliment. Whatever you do, keep the mood alive and avoid crashing into an anticlimax. That’s all you need to do to make sure your first kiss is a great one.

In sum: be respectful, take charge, smell good and go easy on the tongue — oh, and don’t forget to enjoy the moment, too.