KinkPerf Kink Report
May 2026 Kink Trends Report
A privacy-preserving look at the kinklist trends KinkPerf saw in May 2026: top kinks, fastest-rising interests, cooling interests, curiosity clusters, category momentum, and boundary patterns.
May 2026 was KinkPerf's first public monthly trend snapshot. The strongest result was not one single extreme category. Instead, the month was led by a recognizable blend: clothing and visual presentation, affectionate intimacy, oral/manual sex, and structured power exchange.
That combination matters because it shows how people actually use kinklists. A good checklist is not only a fantasy menu. It is a way to mark clear favorites, identify easy yeses, leave room for maybes, and set boundaries around activities that need more conversation or are simply not wanted.
Leaderboard
Top kinks in May 2026
The monthly leaderboard ranks kinks by how often they were marked Favorite, Like, or Okay. Scores are shown on a 100-point scale so trends are easy to compare without exposing private totals.
| Rank | Kink | Category | Index | What stood out |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| #1 | Lingerie | Clothing | 100 | The strongest blended favorite-like-okay trend of the month. |
| #2 | Stockings | Clothing | 97 | Very close to the lead, with both favorite and like ratings carrying the result. |
| #3 | Romance / Affection | General | 94 | The clearest soft-intimacy result in May. |
| #4 | Handjob / fingering | General | 91 | A highly compatible staple with very little boundary pushback. |
| #5 | DD/lg, MD/lb | Domination | 88 | Fewer casual ratings, but one of the strongest favorite concentrations. |
| #6 | Dominant / Submissive | Domination | 88 | Broadly positive and foundational across the domination category. |
| #7 | Collar | Restrictive | 85 | A symbolic restrictive item with durable appeal. |
| #8 | Skinny | Bodies | 85 | The highest-ranking body-preference entry this month. |
| #9 | Uniform / costume | Clothing | 85 | A costume interest that performed well beyond favorite-only ratings. |
| #10 | Cunnilingus | General | 82 | A high-consensus general intimacy item. |
Analysis
What the top 10 says
Lingerie and stockings created a clear clothing cluster at the top of the May report. Not every clothing entry performed the same way. The winners were classic, legible, and easy to discuss. Uniforms and costumes also ranked well, while leather, latex, and cross-dressing sat closer to the curiosity or boundary side of the report.
Romance / Affection ranking third is a useful reminder that kinklist data is not only about edge play. The strongest general-category items were often the ones that make partner communication feel warmer and easier: affection, teasing, oral sex, and manual stimulation.
May's core theme
The most common high-interest pattern was "approachable intensity": visually expressive, emotionally clear, and compatible with ordinary partner conversation.
Category index
Category trends
Category rankings combine rated kinks within each category and compare them against the strongest category of the month. General and Domination led the month, while Clothing overperformed through a few very strong entries.
- #1General100
Everyday intimacy, affection, teasing, and oral/manual sex led the broadest category.
- #2Domination89
Power exchange, D/s roles, discipline, and related structure were close behind.
- #3Pain73
Pain had strong breadth, but also more curiosity and boundary responses than the leaders.
- #4Clothing69
Lingerie, stockings, heels, costumes, and clothed sex made clothing the clearest visual theme.
- #5Bodies48
Body-preference entries were narrower, but several individual kinks ranked high.
- #6Restrictive47
Light bondage and collars kept restrictive play in the upper middle of the report.
- #7Groupings46
Group scenarios showed polarized interest: some high positives, but more hard limits too.
- #8Touch & Stimulation35
A curiosity-heavy category, especially around sensation and foot play.
Rating mix
Like and Favorite were the most common active ratings in May, but No and Maybe were also substantial. That is a useful kinklist pattern: people were not simply rubber-stamping everything. They were making real distinctions between attraction, curiosity, and limits.
Shared-list geography
Most shared-list views came through direct links, with the United States and Canada leading the country chart. This public report uses country-level trends only, not viewer identities or personal tracking.
Momentum
Rising and declining kinks
This month's movement compares early-May ratings with late-May ratings. Once the June report is published, the movement chart can compare month over month directly.
Fastest rising
| Rank | Kink | Category | Movement | What changed |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| #1 | Foot play | Touch & Stimulation | +1.59 | The clearest late-May lift in the interest index. |
| #2 | Monster or Alien | Surrealism | +1.46 | Niche fantasy interest moved upward from a low early-month baseline. |
| #3 | Watersports | Fluids | +1.35 | Still polarizing, but late-month ratings were less boundary-heavy. |
| #4 | Transformation | Surrealism | +1.31 | Another fantasy item with more curiosity later in the month. |
| #5 | Cum play | Fluids | +1.24 | A fluid-related item that moved closer to mainstream-positive in late May. |
| #6 | Nipple clamps | Pain | +1.13 | A notable pain-category climber, helped by stronger late-month interest. |
Cooling interests
| Rank | Kink | Category | Movement | What changed |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| #1 | Domestic servitude | Domination | -1.38 | Still thematically relevant, but softer late-month scoring. |
| #2 | Glory hole | Degradation | -1.19 | A sharper decline in a more polarized category. |
| #3 | Power exchange | Domination | -1.01 | Remained important, but fell from a very strong early-May baseline. |
| #4 | Plugs | Toys | -0.88 | Toy interest cooled relative to the first half of the month. |
| #5 | Gangbang | Misc. Fetish | -0.81 | Group/extreme scenario interest became more cautious. |
| #6 | Swallowing | General | -0.60 | A general-category item with less late-month enthusiasm. |
Maybe index
Curiosity-heavy kinks
Maybe ratings are some of the most useful KinkPerf trends because they show where people may want conversation before commitment. In May, the maybe index leaned toward pain, touch, toys, and higher-negotiation scenarios.
| Rank | Kink | Category | Index | What stood out |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| #1 | Caning | Pain | 100 | The strongest Maybe-rating result in May. |
| #2 | Ass worship | Touch & Stimulation | 92 | High curiosity with meaningful positive interest too. |
| #3 | Alcohol | Consent & boundaries | 83 | A caution-heavy fantasy-context item that generated many maybes. |
| #4 | Tickling | Touch & Stimulation | 83 | Playful, but not universally positive. |
| #5 | Sounding | Toys | 83 | Curiosity and boundary responses both showed up strongly. |
| #6 | Bondage (Heavy) | Restrictive | 75 | A classic escalation point from light bondage into negotiation territory. |
Boundary index
Where hard limits showed up
Boundaries are not failures of interest; they are part of why kinklists are useful. Clear No ratings help people communicate limits before a conversation gets ambiguous, especially around intense, risky, or polarizing activities.
| Rank | Kink | Category | Index | What stood out |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| #1 | Necrophilia | Taboo | 100 | The clearest hard-limit result in the report. |
| #2 | Scat | Fluids | 88 | A strong boundary item with limited positive pull. |
| #3 | Anal fisting | Ass play | 75 | More often marked as a boundary or careful-maybe item. |
| #4 | Blood | Fluids | 67 | A polarizing fluid/pain-adjacent entry. |
| #5 | Cross-dressing | Clothing | 67 | A boundary-heavy result in May despite broader clothing-category strength. |
| #6 | Cutting | Pain | 67 | High caution, consistent with the risk profile of the item. |
Three May 2026 takeaways
1. Visual and relational kinks outperformed shock value.
Clothing led the individual rankings, but not because every visual item was equally popular. The top performers were familiar and easy to name: lingerie, stockings, uniforms, costumes, heels, and clothed sex. These are kinks that can sit comfortably inside flirtation, presentation, roleplay, and anticipation.
2. Power exchange was broad, but not uniform.
DD/lg, MD/lb and Dominant / Submissive both ranked very high, while Power exchange cooled later in the month and Domestic servitude showed the largest downward movement. That suggests the category is not one simple bucket. Role identity, structure, service, discipline, and control each behave differently.
3. Curiosity deserves its own attention.
The maybe-heavy rankings show the difference between "popular" and "worth discussing." Caning, ass worship, tickling, sounding, heavy bondage, latex, gagging, scratching, and anal sex/pegging are not all top-10 positives, but they generated the kind of uncertainty that makes a kink checklist valuable in the first place.
Methodology
How this report was built
This report uses grouped KinkPerf trend data for May 2026. It does not publish raw list totals, user identities, private list links, full referrers, IP addresses, anti-duplicate tracking values, or individual list contents.
Rankings are shown as 100-point indexes so readers can compare trends without seeing private totals. Rising and declining tables compare early May with late May. Curiosity rankings use Maybe ratings, and boundary rankings use No ratings.
Privacy choices
- No public shared-list directory.
- No disclosed monthly list totals.
- No individual user or list-level records.
- No identifiable viewer tracking in this report.
- Only rankings, indexes, and broad trend language.