Girl friend or girlfriend?
girl friend is a noun meaning “A female friend”; girlfriend is a noun meaning “A female partner in an unmarried romantic relationship”. girl friend is written as two words and girlfriend as one word; they are used differently.
What is the difference between girl friend and girlfriend?
| girl friend | girlfriend | |
|---|---|---|
| Part of speech | noun | noun, verb |
| Meaning | A female friend | A female partner in an unmarried romantic relationship A fellow gay man, especially a friend as opposed to a sexual partner |
| Example | none recorded | Marc went to the park with his girlfriend and watched the sunset with her |
| Forms | girl-friends | girlfriends |
| Pronunciation | not recorded | /ˈɡɜːlfɹɛnd/ /ˈɡɝlfɹɛnd/ |
| In writing | not counted (the list counts single words) | 48 times per million words |
Sources: girl friend and girlfriend in the English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0); written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
Every current meaning of girl friend and girlfriend
girl friend
- 1
A female friend
- 2
Alternative form of girlfriend
- 3
Alternative form of girlfriend
girlfriend
- 1
A female partner in an unmarried romantic relationship
Marc went to the park with his girlfriend and watched the sunset with her
- 2
datedA female friend of a woman or girl
Mary always enjoyed hanging out with her girlfriend Jessica
- 3
A fellow gay man, especially a friend as opposed to a sexual partner
[Tim:] james huh? my lover carlos's best girlfriend is named james. [James:] yes, i know. i AM your lover carlos's best girlfriend james
- 4
A term of address for a female friend or among gay men
[Hanque:] girlfriend - how'r we doing? [Doug:] hi hanque, i'd like a capuccino and some lobster bisque.. [Caption:] (friendliness with the waitstaff is a good sign)
Source: the English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0); obsolete, archaic, dialect and rare senses left out.
Which is more common, girl friend or girlfriend?
girl friend is a phrase, which the list of single words does not count; girlfriend 48 times per million words.
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
How many people search girl friend vs girlfriend?
“girl friend vs girlfriend” is searched about 10 times a month on Bing (Google reports it together with close variants, so it has no figure of its own) in the United States.
Sources: Google Ads keyword data through DataForSEO and Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, the average month from September 2025 to August 2026.