Porn addiction quiz: Am I addicted to porn?

This porn addiction quiz is a free, confidential check that takes about 2 minutes. It covers the five areas therapists look at when they assess compulsive sexual behavior, such as control and the cost to your life, and your score gives you a private starting point for reflection.

Its questions follow the five areas of a research screening scale built on World Health Organization guidelines (Bőthe et al., 2020). Only a licensed professional can diagnose a condition, so treat your result as a guide. If your answers point to a pattern worth working on, Mojo's Break Free From Porn program was built around this same framework.

What does this porn addiction quiz measure?

This quiz screens for patterns linked to Compulsive Sexual Behavior Disorder (CSBD), the condition the World Health Organization recognizes. It looks at five areas: control, salience, relapse, dissatisfaction, and negative consequences.

Those five areas come from the CSBD-19, a screening scale built against the World Health Organization's ICD-11 diagnostic guidelines and tested in more than 9,000 people (Bőthe et al., 2020). Some specialists, including Silva Neves, who reviewed this quiz, think the CSBD-19 leans toward finding problems and misses a lot of nuance. So this quiz uses the five areas only as a loose guide, and each question asks about control and what happens next in your life.

In plain terms, here's what each area means:

• Control: whether you can cut back when you try to.
• Salience: whether strong urges to watch porn push other parts of your life aside.
• Relapse: going back to an old pattern after deciding to stop.
• Dissatisfaction: porn no longer feeling satisfying, but you keep watching.
• Negative consequences: real-world costs, like problems with your relationship, sleep, or work.

This quiz was reviewed by Silva Neves, a psychosexual therapist who specializes in compulsive sexual behavior.

Porn addiction vs. Compulsive Sexual Behavior Disorder

“Porn addiction” isn't a formal diagnosis. The WHO's ICD-11 recognizes Compulsive Sexual Behavior Disorder instead, a related condition that a professional can diagnose (Bőthe et al., 2020).

CSBD is about distress and loss of control. How often you watch porn doesn't decide it.

Two people can watch the same amount of porn. One finds it a normal part of their life, while the other feels it's running the show. What separates them is control and distress.

Signs your porn watching might be causing you distress

Signs cluster around the same five areas this quiz measures. They include trying to cut back and not managing it, using porn as your only way to cope with stress or a low mood, and watching when you no longer enjoy it.

A few common signs:

• You keep trying to cut back, and it doesn't stick.
• When you're stressed or bored, watching porn feels like the only way to cope.
• You keep watching even when you no longer enjoy it.
• Watching has started to cause problems with your sleep, work, or relationship, and you keep going anyway.

Some feelings can look like signs but often come from somewhere else. Feeling bad after watching can come from shame, or from a clash between porn and your values, which is called moral incongruence. That feeling alone doesn't show that your watching is a problem.

The same goes for keeping porn to yourself. Privacy is a normal part of a sexual life, and you have a right to private sexual pleasure. Secrecy is different, because it's hiding that comes from shame or fear and starts to strain a relationship.

Many people find porn hard to talk about, often because of shame or not knowing how to start the conversation. So if you've kept your porn watching private, that alone doesn't mean you have a problem.

Pay closest attention to these signs if you've also noticed changes in your erections. Some people find their way to this quiz through porn and erectile dysfunction concerns rather than worries about watching porn itself.

Take the quiz

This takes about 2 minutes. It's private. You don't need to give an email address to see your result, and nothing you answer is shared with anyone.

This quiz is a self-reflection tool inspired by validated research. It is not a medical or psychological diagnosis. Only a licensed healthcare provider can diagnose Compulsive Sexual Behavior Disorder or any other condition. If you're in crisis or having thoughts of harming yourself, contact a crisis line or emergency services in your area.

For each question, pick the answer that fits you best: Never, Rarely, Sometimes, Often, or Almost always.

1. Have you frequently tried to cut back on watching porn and not managed it?
2. Do you often watch porn for longer than you planned to?
3. Do urges to watch porn feel so strong that you end up watching when you'd rather be doing something else, like work or time with a partner?
4. When you're stressed or bored, does watching porn feel like the only way you can cope?
5. Have you frequently tried to stop or take a break, then gone back to your old pattern?
6. After telling yourself “not today,” do you find it hard to stick to your decision?
7. Do you keep watching porn even when you're no longer enjoying it?
8. Does porn feel less satisfying than it used to, but you keep chasing that feeling?
9. Has watching porn caused problems in your relationship, sex life, sleep, or day-to-day responsibilities?
10. Do you keep watching porn even when it's causing problems you'd like to avoid?

Scoring guide: Give yourself points for each answer: Never = 0, Rarely = 1, Sometimes = 2, Often = 3, Almost always = 4. Add up your points across all 10 questions for a total out of 40. This total is a simple self-reflection guide, and it hasn't been tested as a clinical score. Only the full CSBD-19 research scale has a tested cutoff, and this quiz uses its own questions built around the same five areas.

• 0-13: Low concern
• 14-26: Moderate concern
• 27-40: Higher concern

Understanding your quiz results

Your result places you in one of three bands: Low, Moderate, or Higher concern. It's based on how often your answers point to loss of control, strong urges, relapse, dissatisfaction, or life impact. None of these bands are a diagnosis.

This quiz is a self-reflection tool inspired by validated research. It can't diagnose any medical or psychological condition. Only a licensed healthcare provider can diagnose Compulsive Sexual Behavior Disorder or any other condition. If you're in crisis or having thoughts of harming yourself, contact a crisis line or emergency services in your area.

Whatever band you land in, look at the pattern in your answers more than the exact number. Some people also find mindful masturbation practices useful for rebuilding a relationship with pleasure that doesn't depend on porn.