The other day during my obligatory morning doomscroll, I had the misfortune of stumbling upon a particularly bizarre tweet (which, if you’ve ever been on Twitter, you know is saying something) in which a user by the handle of @TrippyRaven compared the taste of vagina to the taste of…laptop. Specifically, and I quote: “I Thought cooochies tasted like strawberries mf taste like laptops.”

This alone, while certainly puzzling, wasn’t particularly distressing. Twitter is a godless country and annoying dudes have been saying weird things about vaginas for as long as there have been annoying dudes and vaginas. Much more alarming, however, were the number of people in the replies who seemed to unironically agree with this gustatory analysis, including a handful of folks who compared the taste of vag to batteries and/or “the heat from a PS4.” (???)

Suffice to say that as a woman who not only has a vagina of my own but has also gotten up close and personal with other people’s vaginas and never once walked away from the experience with the taste of MacBook in my mouth, I was confused. I couldn’t help but wonder…what the actual fuck? Naturally, I did what any girl would do when faced with the realization not only that her vagina might taste like the inside of a Best Buy, but that some men are apparently getting very intimate with their gaming equipment: I sent the tweet to everyone woman I know followed by a text that said, “WTF? IS THIS A THING???”

When the collective response was something to the effect of, “What does laptop taste like?” and/or “Great, new insecurity unlocked,” I did what any ~sex writer~ would do: I called up some of my favorite sexperts and begged them to take time out of their only precious lives to explain why some people on the internet apparently think pussy tastes like electronics, because that’s journalism, baby.

Fortunately, (if kind of shockingly?) they had answers. Among the experts I spoke with, the general consensus seems to be that what these Playstation-munchers are reading as an electronic taste is actually a metallic one—which, BTW, is a perfectly normal taste for a vulva to have.

“A slightly metallic odor or taste is actually quite normal because the vaginal pH is slightly acidic,” says Gigi Engle, certified sex educator for 3Fun.

Quick human bio refresher for ya: “Vaginal odor is a combination of smells produced by the byproducts of different microbes within the vaginal microbiome and surrounding genital area,” explains Krystal Thomas-White, PhD, Senior Scientist at Evvy.

In other words, vaginas do have a taste and smell—they’re supposed to, they’re a body part. That taste and smell, as Engle put it, “is vagina.”

Now, what exactly eau de vag smells and tastes like can vary significantly from vulva-haver to vulva-haver, and even depending on external factors like where one is in their menstrual cycle or if they’ve recently had sex. While some of these tastes and smells may signal an infection or pH imbalance that requires medical attention, such as the “fishy” odor often associated with BV, there is a wide range of totally healthy, totally normal smells for a vagina to have—including a metallic one.

According to ob-gyn Sara Twogood, MD, an expert for Queen V, this metallic and/or “laptop” taste is likely due to either the natural acidity of the vagina—an important part of the vag’s self-cleaning mechanism, BTW—or the presence of blood in the vagina during or around the time of menstruation.

“Blood has a metallic taste because of its iron content,” explains Engle, adding that this particular flavor of vag may be stronger around the time of the vagina-haver’s period, “as trace amounts of blood may still be in and around the vagina.”

Urologist Anika Ackerman, MD adds that having sex might also contribute to a more metallic taste, as the presence of “foreign substances” like semen in the vagina can throw off your pH.

So yeah, it’s possible your vagina might taste like a laptop sometimes—if for some reason you happen to know what laptops taste like and think that taste is a metallic one—and there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that. Remember, despite what the Vaginal Hygiene Industrial Complex may have told you, your vagina is not supposed to smell or taste like fruit or flowers, says Thomas-White. It’s supposed to smell and taste like vagina.

The only problem with comparing that taste to electronics—which, while very weird, isn’t necessarily an insult, per se—is the implication that it is somehow wrong, bad, or gross, which is all part of the age-old shame game patriarchy has been playing for eons to suppress and control women’s sexuality.

“Accepting the way your vagina tastes and or smells is empowering for female sexuality, so anything people (men) can do to subdue our sexual freedom will and has been used as a tool,” says Engle. “The idea that vaginas are weird, gross, or smell is part of a systemic cultural ideology that female sexuality needs to be quelled.”

So unless you have an infection (in which case, also zero shame—people get sick all the time and hi, that’s what gynos are for) your vagina smells and tastes exactly the way it’s supposed to. Don’t let any laptop lickers or Playstation huffers convince you otherwise.

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