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Agender

Genderless

Having no gender, said as plainly as English allows. Agender's plain-English twin, for when the absence needs no footnote.

  • One of seventeen Agender identities
  • No settled flag
  • 4 min read
A character reading among plants and bookshelves

A shorter entry: the essentials, written to the same standard. The fuller guides are on the main identities.

What it is

Genderless means what it says. No gender. Not a neutral one, not a faint one, not one that comes and goes. The word is the ordinary English adjective, and that is most of why people choose it: agender needs explaining and genderless does not.

The record on the LGBTQIA+ Wiki treats the two as usually interchangeable, and adds that some prefer genderless because it shows more clearly that one does not have a gender. It also notes a second use: genderless as an umbrella over agender, gendervoid and similar words. Both uses are current. Nobody is going to rule on it.

What it is not: a mood, a politics or a style. A person who thinks gender is nonsense and would rather it went away can be entirely a woman. Genderless is a report about what is there when you look inward — nothing — not a view about what should be there for anyone else.

Pronouns

They/them is the most common, because it says nothing. Plenty keep he or she out of habit, safety or family peace. Some use it/its by choice, which is theirs to pick and never yours to apply. Some want the name and nothing else. None of this is more genderless than the rest.

Does this sound like you?

Someone asks how you feel about being a woman, or a man, and you realise the question assumes a thing you do not have.
Agender always needed a follow-up sentence. Genderless ended the conversation, which is what you wanted.
Sir and madam are wrong in exactly the same way, and neither wrongness stings.
You read descriptions of dysphoria and found nothing to hang them on. The body is fine. It is the label that does not attach.
You spent years assuming everybody was performing and was privately as blank as you. Learning otherwise was a genuine shock.
The gender box on a form is the one you leave until last.
You do not feel you lost something. There was never a something.

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Nearby identities

The distinction is the useful part.

Agender

A near-synonym, and the record says so. The difference is register: agender is the community's word, genderless the plain one. Many people use both and mean the same thing.

Compare Genderless and Agender →
Neutrois

A neutral gender, and for many people a wish for a neutral body. Genderless makes no claim about the body at all — it describes what is inside, and stops there.

Compare Genderless and Neutrois →
Gendervoid

An absence with an ache: a gap where something should be. Genderless usually has no ache. The question simply does not apply.

Compare Genderless and Gendervoid →
Null Gender

Another near-synonym, leaning on void and nothingness rather than plain absence. Pick by which word sounds like the inside of your head.

Compare Genderless and Null Gender →
Gender neutral

Often a word about presentation, language or a stance rather than an identity. Genderless is an identity claim: not neutral, none.

Compare Genderless and Gender neutral →

It might not be you if…

  • Something faint is there. If you would say "barely, but yes", that is demigender or greygender. Genderless is not a small amount. It is none.
  • The blank arrived when everything else went flat, and food and friends went flat with it. Give it time before naming it. A gender that has gone quiet often comes back.
  • You hate the rules bolted to your gender, and would still be a woman or a man with the rules removed. That is a person who hates the rules, and it is a different page.
  • You do not care what you are. Not caring is gender apathy, which is about caring. Genderless is about having.

Questions people ask

Is genderless the same as agender?

Usually, yes. The wiki treats them as interchangeable and notes that some prefer genderless because it states the absence more clearly. A few use genderless as a wider umbrella covering agender, gendervoid and similar words. In practice the choice is about which word gets you understood in the room you are standing in.

Is there a genderless flag?

Yes, more than one. The wiki records a flag designed in 2021 with feedback from the genderless community: black and white stripes for the spectrum of genderlessness — void for some, no room for gender for others — purple for those partly male, female or both, green for those partly a gender that is neither, and yellow for the community. It also records an older flag posted on DeviantArt in 2016. The usual symbols are a circle with an X or a line through it, the second of which is shared with agender.

Am I trans if I'm genderless?

You can be, if the word is useful to you. Trans as an umbrella covers people whose gender is not the one assigned at birth, and none is not what anyone was assigned. Some genderless people use trans, some use non-binary only, some use neither. No medical step is required to count and none is expected.

Guide · 14 min readAgender Identity: What It Means to Live Without Gender

Ask most people what gender they feel like and something comes back. Ask an agender person and the line stays open.

Guide · 10 min readAm I Non-Binary? 15 Signs You Might Be, and What to Do Next

You have probably read a list like this before. This one includes the parts that usually get left out: the forms, the money, the people…

Kai Moss Editor (pen name)

Last updated · How these pages are written and checked

No flag is shown because none is settled. Text: written from how people who use the word Genderless describe it.

Sources:

This is not a clinical instrument, not a diagnosis, and not evidence of anything about anyone. It describes experiences so you can recognise your own — or rule them out.