Should you kiss on the first date? Toronto residents share their thoughts

It’s the end of a first date, here comes the awkward moment: do you hug, kiss or simply part ways?

In a day and age where a first date can sometimes end in sex rather than kissing, it’s hard to know the proper etiquette at the end of a date. Do you take it slow? Fast? Or awkwardly try to avoid the situation altogether?

For this edition of This Is Dating Now, we asked Torontonians if they kiss on the first date, and we hit up Toronto’s famous party strip: King St W. to get residents’ thoughts. 

Do you kiss on the first date?

Ivory says her answer depends on how she meets her date. 

“If you’re finding him from the street… and I never knew them, then no, that would never happen,” she explained, adding that for her, a kiss on the first date only happens if she already knows the person.

Her friend Sydney agreed, saying she wants to get to know the person she’s seeing before things get vulnerable.

Ethan C. echoes this, saying you have to “get to know them better” before sharing a kiss,so he doesn’t usually kiss on the first date.

Despite the cautious approach from some, other Torontonians do go for the kiss. But does it always work out? Not necessarily. Alfred H. said that kissing on the first date can go wrong.

“I think we’ve all been there, I’m not gonna lie,” he explained, adding that in the past he has regretted kissing on a first date. 

 “But that’s what I learned from my experiences, that’s why I don’t do that anymore.”

Now, Alfred sees a first date as a chance to “feel out vibes, see how things are, how things are going.”

Emily C. says she’ll kiss on the first date if he’s nice. Has it ever worked out? She laughs: “No, I’m single.” But with the dating pool these days, who can blame her?

But it’s not always doomed. Clint K. says he goes by the vibe.

“If the time is right, if the mood is right,” he explained, adding that it’s always worked out for him. 

Andrew D. gives the boldest answer: he’s all for kissing on the first date.

“I want to make out with people,” he explained. “Like, if I catch a vibe, our lips will be touching, you know what I mean.”

He continues, “If I’m attracted to you and you’re a cool person,not a shitty human being, and I want to see you again, yeah, you can come back to my place. We can make out a little if you know what I mean.”

He jokes that for the record (and for his parents, if they’re reading), a first date has never gone further than kissing.

Expert weighs in: To kiss or not to kiss

Toronto-born sex educator and Bumble Relationship expert Shan Boodram told This is Dating Now that when it comes to kissing on the first date, it’s important to pay attention to body language and make sure that you’re on the same page as the other person.

“I think that intimacy is best when it’s mutual, gradual and logical,” Boodram shared, adding that it’s important to understand signals, such as light touches, lots of eye contact, and conversations around your chemistry.

She explained that in contemporary Toronto contexts, kissing doesn’t hold the same value it once did. 

“We don’t assign as much meaning to a kiss as we do sex.” 

Boodram explained that at weddings, the concept of the officiant saying “you may now kiss the bride” at the end of the ceremony comes from the old tradition of a couple waiting for their wedding day to share their first kiss. 

But “most people don’t subscribe to that level of chastity anymore [today], so you don’t have as much of a social pressure and expectation of the first kiss,” shared Boodram.

So, is kissing on a first date actually effective?

“When you have a really positive experience, that can be a way to really fuel you to continue the relationship, because you may feel like there is some type of predestined or cosmic compatibility between the two of you,” she said. 

Boodram added that a first kiss can also be a sign of incompatibility. 

“…You’ll often hear people who break up say there were signs in the beginning, and they may reference a bad first kiss… or go back to the first impression,” Boodram said.

But she doesn’t believe kissing influences the “respect” a partner will have for you if you “give up the lips or don’t.” She adds that kissing on a first date doesn’t typically decrease your chance for a second date either, because that shared moment shows that “there’s mutual investment and that there’s interest, if, again, both people actually wanted it,” explained Boodram.

But who should initiate the kiss? Traditionally, men are expected to take the lead, but does it need to stay that way? Boodram explains that sometimes it’s still the case, but these days, “women are more in control of what they want, and they’re not afraid to take the lead.” 

But if you wait too long, she explains, it might make the other party question whether or not the connection was platonic. But she reassures Torontonians that “there’s a million different ways that you can indicate to someone that you’re genuinely interested, like prolonged eye contact, Public Displays of Fondness (PDF) where you’re just touching that person’s elbow or learning into them, or nodding when they talk and smiling at them…”

But if you do want to kiss, it’s crucial to ask for consent. Showing some Canadian pride, she shares that “Heated Rivalry” is the perfect example of how consent can be sexy. 

“Consent can be an aid to the moment, as opposed to a break for the moment.” Ways to ask are ‘can I kiss your lips, they look really great,’ or ‘you have beautiful lips, I don’t just want to look at them.’”

Read More

• Sex, hockey, and romance: Why everyone is obsessed with Crave’s ‘Heated Rivalry’
• Is chivalry dead or just different? Torontonians weigh in on how romance is evolving
• How early is too early to say ‘I love you?’ Toronto residents weigh in
• ‘Heated Rivalry’s’ Hudson Williams shares viral moment with Prime Minister Mark Carney

Boodram concluded that sharing intentions upfront helps people navigate physical boundaries. She explained that dating apps like Bumble make it easy to state whether you’re seeking intimacy, a serious connection, or something else. 

“Dating apps cancel out the two big questions we have whenever we see somebody out in the world that we’re attracted to. When we see someone, we think, ‘Oh my gosh, is that person single? And are they interested in me?’… [But with] Bumble, you can really quickly put your dating intentions.” explained Boodram.

Got a dating story for us? We want to hear it! Send your experiences to news@nowtoronto.com for a chance to be featured in a future edition of This Is Dating Now.