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Married people are called "spouses" and people that are in a romantic relationship and live together without being married are called "cohabitants" – but what do you call people who are in a romantic relationship that is, for all intents and purposes, the same as marriage/cohabitation, but who don't live together? My bilingual dictionary suggests "live-apart partner", but I find very little actual support for this when I google it, and no support at all on Ngrams. So, what's the proper term for this kind of partnership? I realise one could use "boyfriend/girlfriend" or just "partner", but I'm after the term for the specific kind of partnership, in line with "spouse" and "cohabitant".

Edit: I'd be very grateful if the person who downvoted my question could explain what is wrong with it/in what way it doesn’t meet a English Language Learners Stack Exchange guideline, so I can learn from my mistakes!

Helen
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  • Comments are not for extended discussion; this conversation has been moved to chat. – Laurel Oct 24 '22 at 15:18
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    Maybe I've had it backwards all these years, but does "partner" necessarily imply you live together? Perhaps you can expand a little on why "partner" doesn't work? – BruceWayne Oct 25 '22 at 00:27
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    @BruceWayne it does not; partner merely means a romantic relationship, with no implication on living status (though with some connotation of it being a serious relationship). – Drake P Oct 25 '22 at 01:09
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    @DrakeP The impression I get is that the meaning has evolved, and that "partner" used to be used mainly for cohabiting couples but is now broad enough that it can;t be assume to imply that – Chris H Oct 25 '22 at 11:14
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    "Live-a-partner" !! :-)) – Peter - Reinstate Monica Oct 25 '22 at 15:05
  • @BruceWayne "Partner" doesn't work simply because it's too vague – whereas it could refer to the kind of partner I'm talking about, it could also refer to someone you live with or even someone you're married to. – Helen Oct 25 '22 at 16:24
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    @Helen I dont understand. You can be married or unmarried. If married or not, you can be living together or living apart. "Partner" works for any of these. Are you looking specifically for a word that is for two unmarried people, living apart, but in a relationship? If you are really trying to emphasize you don't live with your partner, you would simply have to explain that as I don't think there's a word in English for that. Is there a situation you can give us where this important distinction has come up? – BruceWayne Oct 25 '22 at 18:09
  • @BruceWayne I need it for a formal situation (formal in the sense 'not informal' as well as in the (rather far-fetched) sense 'appearing in a form') where you need to indicate marital status, and where the available options are 'married', 'cohabitant' and 'live-apart partner'. The discussion in here has made me realise, though, that this is a very Swedish situation, which wouldn't really come up in the UK/US etc., which makes it hard to find a proper term in English. I've decided to go with "live-apart partner" after all, since in the context, it should be clear to everyone what it refers to. – Helen Oct 25 '22 at 20:10
  • Clarification please - is it romantic or purely physical ? If the latter, there are many names but tend toward slang which may be OT. – Criggie Oct 25 '22 at 22:01
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    @Helen In the context of a form field like the one you describe, the distinction you wish you make should be indicated with the complementary options 'partner (cohabiting)' and 'partner (non-cohabiting)', possibly substituting 'partner' for 'unmarried' or similar, as appropriate. Is the form specifically trying to identify (non-marital?) relationships in conjunction with cohabitation status? Should 'married' also be split into '(non-)cohabiting' pairs? 'Married' certainly does not imply cohabitation, to be clear. – Fie Oct 25 '22 at 23:52
  • @Fie Thanks for your suggestions! I think I'll just go with "live-apart partners" after all, since in the typically Swedish context in which it appears, people are likely to understand what's meant by it, since this is a very well-established category in Sweden :) – Helen Oct 27 '22 at 13:50
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    @Criggie Romantic – as I say in my OP: "people who are in a romantic relationship that is, for all intents and purposes, the same as marriage/cohabitation, but who don't live together". Not even Sweden has official forms asking about FBs or FWBs ;)) – Helen Oct 27 '22 at 13:55
  • The word you are looking for is "girlfriend" or "boyfriend". How does the accepted answer not mention this :) – Cheetaiean Oct 28 '22 at 16:42
  • @Cheetaiean This isn't correct: the term 'boyfriend'/'girlfriend' doesn't imply that you don't live together. What gave you that impression? – Fie Oct 30 '22 at 02:43
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    @Cheetaiean The accepted answer probably doesn't mention it since I distinctly say in my OP that girlfriend/boyfriend is not what I'm looking for ;) Plus, what Fie said. – Helen Oct 30 '22 at 14:34
  • Fie, boyfriend and girlfriend does somewhat imply you do not live together and is the essence of a casual, non-binding relationship. Otherwise you are cohabiting, even in light of Canadian law you are now a formal partnership (common-law partners). – Cheetaiean Oct 30 '22 at 21:20
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    @Cheetaiean Unless you believe that the question ought to be taken literally to be asking what you call such a thing, this platform is intended to help people with what things mean, not what some people believe they 'somewhat imply'. :P – Fie Oct 31 '22 at 17:59

7 Answers7

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There are a number of different situations.

For people at the start of their relationship, living apart is the norm. Girlfriend/boyfriend would seem to be the best words, especially for younger people (but they also work fine for older people). Because it is the norm, no special word or modifier is needed.

People who are not only living apart, but living so far apart that they cannot regularly meet are said to have a "long-distance relationship".

Spouses may live apart from each other because their relationship has broken down and they have separated. But they are not in a romantic relationship anymore.

So there is a final category: people who are in a long term romantic relationship, with the stability of a marriage, but don't live together, but do live close to each other. This is a rare situation. I suppose there might be some celebrities or ultra-rich who have separate households. If you need to mention the fact, I think you'd need to describe it.

Kate is my partner of 18 years, and though we've never lived together, I feel we are as close as any other couple.

But generally you would simply not mention it.

Kate is my partner. W've been together for 18 years.

James K
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    This is so interesting! "So there is a final category: people who are in a long term romantic relationship, with the stability of a marriage, but don't live together, but do live close to each other. This is a rare situation. I suppose there might be some celebrities or ultra-rich who have separate households." This is completely different in my country – here this situation is so common we have (and need to have) a specific term for it! – Helen Oct 23 '22 at 20:48
  • What is the term? – James K Oct 23 '22 at 20:53
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    In Swedish you mean? Särbo – "sär"='apart', "bo"='live'/'someone who lives in a particular place' – Helen Oct 23 '22 at 20:54
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    Take a look at this article https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-families/swedish-words-modern-relationships-describe-dating-love-a7377746.html – James K Oct 23 '22 at 21:06
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    :)) See – told ya we need these words ;)) – Helen Oct 23 '22 at 21:20
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    We have 'significant other', 'friend with benefits', and 'f---k buddy' that we can use. – Michael Harvey Oct 24 '22 at 08:58
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    "This is a rare situation" - not in my circle. People in their 60s and 70s, grown up families, divorced or widowed, with their own homes - and genuine love (not "friends with benefits") – Psionman Oct 24 '22 at 11:26
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    @Psionman perhaps you could answer. What do these people use to refer to each other, or their situation. – James K Oct 24 '22 at 12:48
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    HaHa! - I tried "friend" once - it did not go down well! - "Partners, but we don't live together" - ugly, awkward, but the best we've come up with – Psionman Oct 24 '22 at 12:55
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    You missed a category. I'm far from unique. In my part of the world (Eastern Canada), thousands of people continue to call it "home" while travelling for work and leaving spouse and sometimes children behind. Some of them get home often. Some, like me, get home for a month every year. – Auspex Oct 24 '22 at 13:53
  • @Auspex To most of the folks in the U.S. that sort of situation would still fall under the "long-distance" category even if both people are married with kids and call the same place home. (The most typical examples here tend to be truck-drivers or deployed military.) – DotCounter Oct 26 '22 at 16:36
  • @Helen, By the way, here is a book of words that have no English translation. https://www.amazon.co.uk/Lost-Translation-Illustrated-Compendium-Untranslatable/dp/0224100807/ref=asc_df_0224100807/?tag=googshopuk-21&linkCode=df0&hvadid=310814759462&hvpos=&hvnetw=g&hvrand=10024140594382045026&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=&hvdev=c&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=1006689&hvtargid=pla-453546404330&psc=1&th=1&psc=1 It includes the Swedish Resfeber – James K Oct 28 '22 at 17:06
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Though easy to understand literally, "live-apart partner" is awkward and unnatural, and at least in my mind, raises the wrong kind of partnership.

It puts so much emphasis on living apart that it makes me think of couples like Helena Bonham Carter and Tim Burton who were married, but lived in separate homes next door to each other.

It's not the kind of thing that seems to need describing often enough. It's like we have the common expression "a sit-down meal", but there's no special expression to describe "eating while standing".

gotube
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    Japanese has a special expression for eating while standing "tachigui"... which I suppose is the point. There are often meanings that one language has words for, that another language doesn't have. I wonder if Swedish needs a word that means tachigui. – James K Oct 24 '22 at 07:08
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    Very off-topic, but some cultures seem to do a lot of eating standing up - it seems popular in Berlin - while others don't. Although in the UK and US it's common to eat while walking (particularly with fast/takeaway food and snacks), which I'm told is frowned upon in much of Europe. – Stuart F Oct 24 '22 at 09:25
  • @JamesK Actually, we don't have a word or expressions for either of these two situations (sitting down or standing up while eating) :) – Helen Oct 24 '22 at 23:00
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    To add to this, I don't think anyone would describe their romantic partner as a cohabitant. If anything, to me at least, that implies an unromantic relationship. – Dean MacGregor Oct 25 '22 at 09:34
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    @DeanMacGregor cohabiting** is common (UK) for unmarried couples living together, and not just sharing a house. Sometimes a term is needed, for example in describing housing arrangements for tax purposes. – Chris H Oct 25 '22 at 11:17
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    @ChrisH I believe the act of cohabiting is common in the US as well. I just meant that I would never refer to someone's romantic partner, with whom they're living, as their cohabitant. Are you saying it's common for people to call their partners cohabitants on the other side of the pond or only for legal purposes? – Dean MacGregor Oct 25 '22 at 13:52
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    @DeanMacGregor the word "cohabiting" is reasonably widely used - but mainly in legal and similar contexts, or if an unambiguous term is otherwise needed. I'm sure I have seen the word "cohabitant" before this question, but it's very far from common; it looks almost like an error, but would be a sensible choice to describe the other half of a cohabiting couple if such a noun was needed. (With all the asterisks for italics and bold I missed the lack of quotes when I introduced "cohabiting", or I would have been clearer the first time) – Chris H Oct 25 '22 at 14:04
  • @JamesK Fascinating! The phrase "eating while standing up" was used by my one of my Linguistics profs as an example of a meaning that doesn't have a word because speakers hadn't found the distinction was necessary. – gotube Nov 15 '22 at 16:46
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If they live far apart, this is a long-distance relationship. If they’re still officially married but living apart, they’re separated (unless you say they’re separated by some circumstance, this term implies that they are married in name only). If they live nearby, are not married, and are a couple, they’re a boyfriend and girlfriend, or significant others.

Davislor
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There's a term "Living Apart Together" for such phenomenon:

Couples living apart together (LAT) have an intimate relationship but live at separate addresses.

(source: Wikipedia)

The term is not in common use, so your audience might not be familiar with it thus you might have to provide some additional explanation. Moreover, there's no word/phrase for people involved in such relationships, so the best that I can come up with is "people in living apart together relationships" or "people living apart from their partner".

el.pescado - нет войне
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  • "Living Apart Together", and even the acronym "LAT" or (LAT-relationship) are very common in Belgium. Everyone will understand it. – Opifex Oct 25 '22 at 17:35
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Logically, it would seem that the opposite of "live-in partner" would be a "live-out partner", but I think most people wouldn't follow. In polyamory circles, a partner one lives with is a "nesting partner", so one one doesn't live with would be a "non-nesting partner". Most people would likely not be familiar with the term, but I think it's reasonably easy to figure out what it means.

Acccumulation
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The problem here is that there are two separate concepts involved: your legal status and your living arrangements. When I started filling out forms you gave you the choice single/married/widowed/divorced. Then it was realised that many people were in long-term relationships so co-habiting or partner became included but as part of married not as a separate category. Then we developed civil partnerships. If you really want to know whether they are eligible to marry you then you need to know their civil status if you want to know whether when they go home from hospital there will be someone there to look after them you need to know their living arrangements.

So if someone asks you you need to guess which aspect they are concerned about and respond appropriately.

mdewey
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When I was a teenager in the 70s the labels we used for two people who were romantically involved but did not live together and had not bound themselves legally in marriage were...

  • Girlfriend
  • Boyfriend

I can see an argument that the terms Girlfriend and Boyfriend might not be specific enough. In other words, someone might want to separate such a relationship based either on chastity or some common-law legal precedent that I'm unaware of.1 But I don't know of one that's universally accepted with one possible exception: "significant other."

I also recognize the growing trend of gender ambiguation that leads to a desire to not use terms that establish gender. The unfortunate truth is we're 50-100 years away from commonly used terms recognizable outside the subculture. I am not trying to marginalize, exclude or in any other way suggest that there shouldn't be terms that better describe these kinds of situations. But today, 99% of the U.S. population would barely understand such terms when used (e.g., "living together apart," which I experienced for the first time in this post) and wouldn't use them out of habit.

Please note that part of the problem is that there is no definition for what makes a "living together apart" relationship true or false other than the claim of the partners. Excluding a marriage committment, what defines a committed relationship? Sexual intimacy? No. Spending time together? No. Paying each other's medical bills? Maybe. Combining incomes? Probably. Is the condition temporary? ("My partner is working in Dubai for three years, so we're living together apart because we use the same checking account") or permanent? ("My partner lives a couple of miles away. We share the same bank account, but pay for different residences...") That ambiguity is why terms like Girlfriend and Boyfriend continue to be used and why you're having so much trouble locating a term to replace those words.

Today in the U.S., if you describe a couple such as you have and label them using Girlfriend and/or Boyfriend you would not be misunderstood.

BTW, In my area using the word "cohabitants" would get you the same funny stares as using the term "coitus" for "sexual intimacy." Here, it's considered a technical term. The term we would use for people living together unmarried in a sexual relationship is "partners." I wouldn't be surprised if the term changed with region.

1 In some U.S. states, if you live together in a committed relationship long enough, you are considered married for the purpose of legal ownership of property. This is called "common-law marriage" and in some instances the government would refer to the members as "spouses." However, this is a legal distinction and its use by the public would surprise me. I expect that whatever term is used by the couple to identify their relationship is what their neighbors would use.

JBH
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  • Thank you for your answer! I totally see what you mean, and I realise that this is the way it is in English-speaking countries; thing is, in my own country, this is an established kind of relationship, that you have an "official" term for – when I wrote my OP it didn't occur to me that it might not be the same in English-speaking countries :) – Helen Oct 27 '22 at 15:27
  • So, in answer to the last paragraph of your answer: I totally realise "cohabitant" isn't something you use in everyday conversation, but that's precisely my point: I need a "technical"/"official" term in line with "spouse" and "cohabitant". I now realise there isn't one, since in English-speaking countries, this kind of relationship isn't generally acknowledged as one of three main kinds (married, cohabiting, living apart) – Helen Oct 27 '22 at 15:27