Passing a gallstone typically feels like an intense, cramping or squeezing pain under your right ribcage that comes on suddenly and lasts anywhere from 20 minutes to a few hours. Most people describe it as a steady, gripping sensation rather than a sharp stab that comes and goes, and it often radiates into your right shoulder or back. The pain usually stops once the stone dislodges and moves through.
Where You Feel It and What It Feels Like
The pain centers in your upper abdomen, just below the right side of your ribcage. That’s where your gallbladder sits, tucked beneath your liver. When a gallstone shifts and gets wedged in the narrow tube leading out of the gallbladder, the gallbladder squeezes harder to try to push the stone through. That muscular contraction is what produces the pain.
People describe the sensation in different ways: sharp, cramping, squeezing, or a steady gnawing grip. Johns Hopkins characterizes it as a “steady gripping or gnawing pain” rather than the wave-like cramping you might associate with intestinal issues. It can radiate upward into your right shoulder blade or wrap around to your upper back, which catches many people off guard. Some initially think they’re having a back problem or even chest pain.
The pain isn’t positional. Lying down, sitting up, or walking around generally doesn’t relieve it. It builds quickly, plateaus at a high intensity, and stays there until the stone either passes through or falls back into the gallbladder.
Other Symptoms That Come With It
The pain alone is usually not the full picture. Nausea and vomiting are common during an attack, and many people feel an overall sense of being unwell. Some experience sweating or restlessness simply from the intensity of the pain. You may also notice bloating or a feeling of fullness in the upper abdomen that doesn’t resolve with belching or passing gas.
People with chronic gallbladder issues sometimes report ongoing, lower-grade symptoms between attacks: gassiness, mild nausea after meals, and general abdominal discomfort. These don’t reach the severity of a full attack but can become a persistent background annoyance.
What Triggers an Attack
Fatty meals are the most reliable trigger. When you eat fat, your body signals the gallbladder to contract and release bile to help with digestion. If a stone is sitting in the gallbladder, that contraction can push it into the duct opening, starting the whole cycle of pain. Attacks commonly begin 30 minutes to 2 hours after eating, particularly after fried foods, butter-heavy dishes, creamy sauces, processed meats, or baked goods made with trans fats.
Some attacks happen at night, which may relate to a late dinner or the gallbladder’s natural overnight activity. Not every attack has an obvious dietary trigger, but meals high in fat are by far the most common culprit.
How Long It Lasts and What Happens After
A typical episode lasts 20 minutes to a few hours. If the stone dislodges on its own, the pain fades relatively quickly. Smaller stones can pass all the way through the common bile duct into the intestines and eventually leave your body without you ever knowing. In that case, the episode may be a one-time event, at least until another stone shifts.
After an attack resolves, your abdomen may feel sore and tender for the rest of the day, similar to the lingering ache after a muscle cramp. Many people feel drained or fatigued. Appetite often takes a while to return, and you may instinctively avoid eating for several hours afterward.
A first attack can often be managed at home with over-the-counter pain relievers. But recurrence is common. Once you’ve had one episode of biliary colic, there’s a reasonable chance you’ll have another, and many people are eventually referred for an ultrasound to confirm gallstones and discuss whether surgery makes sense.
Gallstone Pain vs. Kidney Stone Pain
Because both involve “passing a stone,” people often confuse the two, but the location and character are quite different. Gallstone pain lives in the upper right abdomen and refers to the right shoulder or upper back. Kidney stone pain hits your lower back or flank and radiates downward toward the groin and lower abdomen. Kidney stones also cause urinary symptoms like painful urination, blood in the urine, and increased urgency, none of which happen with gallstones.
Both can cause severe pain and nausea, but the geography of the pain is usually enough to tell them apart. Upper right and radiating up means gallbladder. Lower back and radiating down means kidney.
When the Pain Signals Something More Serious
Not every gallstone passes cleanly. If a stone gets completely stuck in the bile duct, the gallbladder wall can become inflamed, a condition called cholecystitis. The key difference: the pain does not go away after a few hours, and fever develops. Cholecystitis requires hospital treatment.
Stones can also get stuck further down the ductal system, leading to more dangerous complications. A stone blocking the duct where it meets the pancreas can trigger gallstone pancreatitis, which causes severe pain on the upper left side of the abdomen, often described as sharp or squeezing, radiating to the chest, shoulder, or back. This can escalate to a swollen abdomen, rapid heart rate, and low blood pressure.
A blockage in the common bile duct can also cause jaundice (yellowing of the skin and eyes), dark urine, fever with chills, or infection of the bile ducts. Any of these require urgent care.
The practical red flags to watch for: pain that lasts more than a few hours and isn’t improving, fever at any point during or after an attack, yellowing of your skin or eyes, or pain so severe that over-the-counter medications don’t touch it. Any of those shifts the situation from “gallstone passing on its own” to “something is stuck and needs medical attention.”