HOW COMMON IS REGRET AFTER TRANSITION?
By the best available evidence, regret after gender-affirming care is uncommon. Studies of adults who had gender-affirming surgery find regret rates of around 1%, and in a large national survey, fewer than 1% of transgender people said that transition was not right for them. Regret does happen for some people, and their experiences are real and deserve support. Two honest caveats matter for reading these numbers. The strongest regret data come from adult surgical studies, and surgery is not part of care for young people; regret about other steps, and long-term regret in young people specifically, is less well studied. Regret is also different from detransition, and where regret occurs, it is often tied to complications, loss of support, or feeling under-informed rather than simply a mistaken identity.
Regret is one of the most emotionally charged topics in this area. It’s also one of the most often misrepresented, sometimes with figures inflated far beyond what research supports, and sometimes with the real experiences of people who do feel regret dismissed. This page aims for the honest middle: the best-supported figures, their genuine limits, and what regret does and does not mean. For the related and distinct question of how often people stop or reverse a transition, see our page on the detransition rate.
"Regret" means wishing one had not taken a step. It is distinct from "detransition," which means stopping or reversing a transition, often for reasons unrelated to regret. This page keeps the two separate.
CONTENT NOTE
This is information, not medical advice, and it explains a clinical scale rather than any individual's care. Whether and when any medication is appropriate for a particular young person is a decision for that young person, their family, and their qualified healthcare providers, and in nearly all cases, minors cannot receive it without parental consent. If you are in immediate danger, call 911; for support any time, call or text 988.
Updated November 2026
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Regret is uncommon. The best estimates put regret after gender-affirming surgery at around 1% in adults.
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The strongest data are adult and surgical. Surgery is not part of care for young people, so these figures describe adults.
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The figures have limits. Estimates rest on studies of varied quality, and long-term regret data, especially for youth, are limited.
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Regret is not detransition. They are different things and should not be conflated.
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When regret happens, reasons vary. It is often linked to complications, loss of support, or feeling under-informed, not simply a mistaken identity.
KEY TAKEAWAYS
WHAT THE BEST EVIDENCE SHOWS
The strongest evidence, from studies of adults who had gender-affirming surgery, finds that regret is uncommon, on the order of 1%.
Sources: Bustos et al., Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery Global Open (2021); Turban et al., 2021, via Fenway Health.
The most-cited figure comes from a 2021 systematic review and meta-analysis in Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery Global Open, which pooled 27 studies and 7,928 transgender adults who had gender-affirming surgery and found a regret prevalence of about 1%, with 77 of the 7,928 patients expressing regret.
Separately, the large 2015 US Transgender Survey found that fewer than 1% of respondents overall reported detransitioning because they felt transition was not right for them, as analyzed by Turban and colleagues. Both figures point in the same direction: by these measures, regret is genuinely uncommon.
THE HONEST LIMITS OF THESE FIGURES
These low figures are the best available estimates, but they are estimates, and they have real limitations worth stating plainly. The surgical meta-analysis has been critiqued on methodological grounds: a peer-reviewed letter noted that most of its included studies were rated as poor or fair quality and argued that its "very low regret" conclusion may therefore be less certain than it appears.
Regret studies are also vulnerable to loss to follow-up, meaning people who might feel regret can drop out of studies and go uncounted, which can push measured rates in either direction. And the surgical figures describe adults; regret specifically about puberty-pausing medication, hormones, or transition overall, and long-term regret among people who started care as young people, is much less studied.
So the honest statement is that regret appears uncommon by the best available measures, while the certainty of any precise figure is limited, part of the wider evidence-quality picture covered on our page on whether gender-affirming care is evidence-based.
REGRET IS NOT THE SAME AS DETRANSITION
Regret and detransition are frequently treated as the same thing, and they are not. Someone can detransition without regret, for example, under family pressure or discrimination, and someone can feel some regret without detransitioning. As the Turban analysis found, the great majority of people who detransition do so for external reasons rather than regret, and the study's authors stated directly that the two are not synonymous.
Conflating them is the most common way regret figures are inflated in public debate. For the reasons people detransition, see why people detransition.
WHEN REGRET DOES HAPPEN, WHY?
Where regret does occur, research suggests it is often connected to surgical complications, loss of family or social support, or feeling under-informed at the time of the decision, rather than a simple mistaken identity.
Qualitative research with people who had discontinued or reversed a transition, such as a 2023 study in PLOS ONE, found that when decisional regret came up, it was often described alongside feeling under-informed about the options or feeling pressure to take one step in order to access another.
Read carefully, these accounts point toward the value of thorough, unhurried, well-informed decision-making, which is what a careful assessment and consent process is designed to provide.
For what that looks like, see how trans teens are assessed for care.
HOW THIS COMPARES TO OTHER MEDICAL PROCEDURES
The available evidence suggests regret after gender-affirming care is lower than regret after many other accepted medical procedures, though this comparison should be read with care. A 2023 analysis in the Journal of Bioethical Inquiry observed that the risk of regret for gender-affirming hormone therapy appears to be substantially lower than for other healthcare interventions that are generally considered acceptable. This is the authors' comparative judgment rather than a single head-to-head study, so the "appears to be" is worth keeping.
The broader point is that regret exists in essentially all of medicine, and by the available measures it appears no higher, and often lower, for this care than for procedures that are not treated as controversial.
THE BOTTOM LINE
By the best available evidence, regret after gender-affirming care is uncommon, while the precision of any single figure is limited and long-term youth-specific data are thin.
Regret is real for the people who experience it, and they deserve support and care rather than dismissal.
It is also genuinely uncommon by every well-conducted measure available; it is distinct from detransition, and where it happens, it is often tied to complications, lost support, or feeling under-informed.
The most honest summary is that regret is rare, but not zero; that the strongest data come from adults; and that better long-term research would sharpen the picture, none of which is the same as evidence that the care is harmful.
