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Finding a known sperm donor in the UK: your options

You'd like a child, and you'd like your donor to be someone with a face, a name and a story: a known donor, so your child can one day know where they come from. Clinic waiting times and costs, and NHS funding rules that vary by area, lead many single women and couples to look for a known donor. Here's how to start without cutting corners.

Written for England · Updated November 2026

General information, not legal or medical advice. The law can change and your situation may be different. Before you decide anything, talk to a family law solicitor and consider a licensed fertility clinic.

Three routes

Clinic donor (sperm bank).Screened, quarantined, identity-release at 18, up to ten families per donor in the UK. You don't meet the donor.
Known donor at a licensed clinic. You find the donor yourselves, then go to an HFEA-licensed clinic together. The clinic screens him, handles consent and legal parenthood, and offers counselling. The clearest legal position, but it costs money.
Known donor at home. Cheaper and more private, but without clinic protections. A single woman or unmarried couple usually ends up with the donor as the legal father. Read Known sperm donors and UK law first.

Where people find known donors

Friends and family, community groups, and matching websites. Some groups and sites are full of men offering ‘natural insemination’, pushing for quick meetings, or donating to dozens of families. The HFEA has warned about exactly that. On our site, sex requests are banned, messaging is free, intended mums start conversations, and you can block or report anyone.

Questions to ask a potential donor

Why do you want to donate, and what role do you imagine (none, occasional contact, co-parent)?
How many children or families have you already donated to? Are you donating to anyone else now?
Would you go to a licensed clinic with us? If not, why not?
Recent sexual health results, and are you willing to test again? What about genetic carrier tests?
What's your family medical history?
What would you want the child to know about you, and when?
Have you thought about child maintenance and legal parenthood? Have you taken advice?

A good donor welcomes these questions. Pressure, vagueness about numbers, refusing any tests, asking for money, or steering towards sex are red flags.

Meeting safely

Video call first. Then meet somewhere public, and tell a friend where you'll be.
Don't share your home address until you're comfortable.
Take your time: several conversations before any decision.
Never pay for sperm, and don't accept frozen sperm or sperm by post or courier: storing and arranging delivery of sperm need an HFEA licence.

Before you try

Get independent legal advice, talk through expectations in writing (knowing a donor agreement isn't legally binding), check test results, and consider counselling. If you're single, also read Single mum by choice with a known donor; as a couple of two women, read Lesbian couples and known donors.

No sex, no ‘natural insemination’

This is a place for donation without sex: home insemination with a cup and syringe, treatment at a licensed clinic, or co-parenting. Asking for or offering sex or ‘natural insemination’ (NI), or sending sexual messages, is not allowed. We suspend profiles that do this. Received a request like that? Please report it from the profile.

Meet people calmly, at your own pace

Join KnownDonor free. No subscription to send a message, no sex requests, no sperm changing hands through us.

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General information about the law in England, November 2026. Not legal, medical or financial advice. KnownDonor is an introduction platform: we never collect, store, test, transport or deliver sperm, and we are not licensed by the HFEA. Sources are linked in the text; where they and this page differ, the source is right.