Sperm: by the numbers

It’s incredible that such a small thing can come in such big numbers. Here are all the most important, impressive, and just plain interesting numbers associated with spermatozoon’s (first interesting fact – that’s the scientific term for them).

• 100,000,000 – This is the average number of sperm cells produced per ejaculate from a healthy male. Scientists have recorded amounts as high as 1.2 billion sperm in a single ejaculate!
• 1,000 – Sperm have to travel a distance that is around 1,000 times their own length to reach your egg.
• 23 – A sperm has half the chromosomes it takes to create the blueprint for your baby. Before the discovery of reproductive science, it was thought that there was a tiny human kept inside the head of sperm, who would slowly grow inside the womb.
• 1879 – This one is actually a year. It’s the year that the fertilization process was proven, and that the interaction between sperm and egg became clear.
• 0.5 – A typical ejactulate is around 0.5 – 1 teaspoon in volume.
• 15 – According to a 2010 report from the World Health Organization, if a man produces fewer than 15 million sperm per ejaculate he may encounter infertility issues. In fact, it seems that infertility is truly a two-way street, with equal instances of infertility being attributed to both the male and female partner.

  If you’re wondering about your male partner’s sperm quantity, but they aren’t so enthusiastic about visiting a fertility clinic, consider trying SpermCheck Fertility. This is the only home-based test of its kind that is able to measure a man’s sperm count with 98% accuracy. While it won’t tell you everything that could be wrong with your partner’s sperm, it’s a quick and discreet way to answer one really big question.

• 120 – Sperm move at about 25 times the length of their body per second. By comparison, a human would have to swim around 120 mph to move that fast.
• 525 – Billion, that is. Some reports have estimated that’s how many sperm cells a male will produce over the course of his lifetime.
• 1677 – This is the year sperm cells were first observed by Antony van Leeuwenhoek, a microscope-maker. That’s over 300 years of sperm!
• 5 – This is the number that helps explain your fertile window. Sperm can live for around 5 days within your cervical fluid as they eagerly wait to come in contact with an egg and create a zygote.
• 1 : 2,000 – It’s estimated that around 1 in 2,000 men who receive a vasectomy are still able to cause a pregnancy. Now those are some strong swimmers!
• 1 – The number of sperm that are needed to reach your egg in order to begin the process of forming a child. It takes so many cells, traveling so quickly, for so many days, all just to make that one special connection.

If you’re TTC and wondering if your partner may be suffering from low sperm count, you can find out right now. Tap the button below to order SpermCheck Fertility, now available at Walgreens, CVS, Target, Meijer, and Rite Aid.