A lot of advice on when to conceive focuses on timing sex around your ovulation dates. However, one of the best ways to increase your chances of conceiving is to have regular sex throughout your menstrual cycle. This will mean there is always sperm waiting to meet the egg when it is released.
If sperm are not ejaculated frequently, but held back in a man's tubes for more than about three days, the quality greatly deteriorates.
You do not have to have sex every day, or on a particular day of the cycle. Sperm can survive and remain fertile for around 5 days, and the egg can be fertilised for up to 24 hours after ovulation.
The danger of waiting until close to ovulation is that the sperm will not have time to get there before the egg disintegrates.
Although you can use an ovulation calculator to work out when to have sex, the best conception tip is to continue to have sex regularly in between the times suggested by the conception calculator as well as during them.
Falcone T, Hurd W, Clinical reproductive medicine and surgery: a practical guide, New York Springer, 2013
Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority, Infertility – common causes of female and male infertility, London HFEA, 2013. Also available at: http://www.hfea.gov.uk/infertility.html (accessed 12 May 2014)
National Institute for Health and Care Excellence, Fertility: assessment and treatment for people with fertility problems, clinical guideline 156, London NICE, 2013
National Institute for Health and Care Excellence, Epilepsy: the diagnosis and management of the epilepsies in adults and children, clinical guideline 37, London NICE, 2012
Review dates
Last reviewed: 13 June 2017
Next review: 13 June 2020
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