See also open marriage. Open marriage typically refers to a marriage in which the partners agree that each is free to engage in extramarital sexual relationships, without regarding this as sexual infidelity. ...
An open relationship denotes a relationship (usually between two people) in which participants are free to take other partners; if the couple making this agreement are married, it is an open marriage. While "open relationship" is sometimes used as a synonym for "polyamory" or "polyamorous relationship", these terms are generally differentiated. The "open" in "open relationship" usually refers to the sexual aspect of a non-closed relationship, whereas "polyamory" refers to the extension of a relationship by allowing bonds to form (which may be sexual or otherwise) as additional long term relationships: Start of polyamory contingent at San Francisco Pride 2004. ...
Some relationships place strict restrictions on partners (e.g. polyfidelity); such relationships are polyamorous, but not open.
Some relationships permit sex outside the primary relationship, but not love (cf swinging); such relationships are open, but not polyamorous.
Some polyamorists do not accept the dichotomies of "in a relationship/not in a relationship" and "partners/not partners"; without these divisions, it is meaningless to class a relationship as 'open' and 'closed'.
Some polyamorists consider 'polyamory' to be their philosophical orientation — they believe themselves capable and desirous of multiple loves — whereas 'open relationship' is used as a logistical description: that is, it is how their polyamory is expressed or implemented. They would say of themselves, for instance, "I am polyamorous; my primary partner and I have an open relationship (with the following ground rules)...."
However, there is enough overlap between the two concepts that 'open relationship' is sometimes used as a catch-all substitute when speaking to people who may not be familiar with 'polyamory'. Polyfidelity, a form of polyamory, is the restricting of ones sexual activities nonpreferentially to a single group of people, each of whom follows the same rules and has sex only within the group. ... Swinging, sometimes referred to in North America as the swinging lifestyle, is non-monogamous sexual activity, treated much like any other social activity, that can be experienced as a couple. ...
An openrelationship denotes a relationship (usually between two people) in which participants are free to take other partners; where the couple making this agreement is married, it is an open marriage.
Some relationships permit sex outside the primary relationship, but not love (cf swinging); such relationships are open, but not polyamorous.
However, there is enough overlap between the two concepts that 'openrelationship' is sometimes used as a catch-all substitute when speaking to people who may not be familiar with 'polyamory'.
An open marriage is a marriage where both parties agree to permit sexual relationships for one or both outside the marriage, without regarding this as sexual infidelity.
Open marriage can be regarded as a broad spectrum of relationship types between strictly monogamous marriages and polyamory (a formal or committed relationship with more than one person).
Open marriage is not the same thing as polygamy, where sexual relationships are kept entirely within the parties to the marriage.
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