About one in three men over the age of 15 worldwide are infected with at least one type of genital HPV. That’s a global prevalence of 31%, based on a large-scale meta-analysis published in The Lancet Global Health and highlighted by the World Health Organization in 2023. One in five men, or 21%, carry a high-risk strain capable of causing cancer.
Prevalence by Age and Region
HPV infection rates in men climb during early adulthood and peak between the ages of 25 and 29. After that, prevalence stabilizes or dips slightly, but it never drops to zero in older age groups. This pattern differs from women, where infections tend to peak soon after sexual debut and then decline more sharply before sometimes rising again later in life.
Geographically, rates are remarkably consistent across most of the world. Europe, North America, Sub-Saharan Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean, and Australia/New Zealand all show similar pooled estimates. The notable exception is Eastern and South-Eastern Asia, where prevalence runs roughly half the rate seen elsewhere. Researchers aren’t entirely sure why, though differences in sexual behavior patterns and circumcision rates may play a role.
Most Infections Clear on Their Own
The high prevalence numbers can sound alarming, but most HPV infections in men are temporary. A U.S. cohort study of 290 men found that the median time to clear an infection was about 5.9 months. Around 75% of men tested negative for the virus within 12 months of first detection, and by 18 months, only about 11% still carried any detectable HPV. High-risk and low-risk strains cleared at comparable rates.
This means the 31% figure is essentially a snapshot: at any given moment, roughly a third of men are carrying the virus, but most of those infections will resolve without treatment or symptoms. The immune system handles the virus silently in the vast majority of cases.
When HPV Does Cause Problems
The most visible consequence of HPV in men is genital warts, caused primarily by HPV types 6 and 11. Among men who develop warts, about 44% test positive for type 6 and 10% for type 11. Warts tend to recur: after an initial episode, subsequent outbreaks become increasingly frequent. The rate of a second episode is roughly 50% higher than the first, and the gap keeps narrowing with each recurrence.
The more serious concern is cancer. In the United States alone, HPV causes an estimated 13,600 cases of throat cancer (specifically oropharyngeal cancer) in men each year, along with 2,300 anal cancers and 900 penile cancers. Throat cancer is now the most common HPV-related cancer in American men, surpassing cervical cancer in women in some recent estimates. These cancers are linked to high-risk strains, particularly types 16 and 18, and typically develop years or decades after the initial infection.
No Approved Test for Men
One reason HPV prevalence in men stayed poorly understood for so long is that there’s no FDA-approved test to screen men for the virus. All currently approved HPV tests are designed for cervical samples. Research into male genital testing is ongoing, but for now, there’s no routine way to check whether a man carries HPV.
This also means there’s no concept of knowing your “HPV status” in the way you might know your status for other sexually transmitted infections. HPV can infect different parts of the body, and a test result can change over months as the immune system clears one infection while a new one is acquired. The practical reality is that most sexually active men will contract HPV at some point, and most will never know it.
Transmission Is Highly Efficient
HPV spreads through skin-to-skin contact during sexual activity, and it’s extraordinarily contagious compared to other sexually transmitted infections. Modeling studies estimate the transmission probability at around 80% per new sexual partner when one person is infected. Per-act transmission estimates range widely, from 5% to 100% depending on the type of contact, but the overall picture is clear: condoms reduce risk but don’t eliminate it, because HPV can infect skin not covered by a condom.
Vaccination Coverage in Young Men
The HPV vaccine is the most effective tool for prevention, and uptake among young men has improved significantly. In the United States, 2024 data from the CDC’s National Immunization Survey show that 77.4% of adolescent boys aged 13 to 17 have received at least one dose of the HPV vaccine. About 61.6% have completed the full series. These numbers represent a major shift from a decade ago, when male vaccination rates lagged far behind female rates.
The vaccine covers the HPV types responsible for the majority of cancers and genital warts. Among men who developed genital warts in one multinational study, 63% to 69% were positive for strains included in the nine-type vaccine, meaning vaccination could have prevented most of those cases. For men who weren’t vaccinated as adolescents, the vaccine is approved up to age 26 in most guidelines, with some flexibility up to age 45 based on individual risk.