Two types of the same virus, with a habit rather than a rule.
Herpes simplex comes in two types. HSV-1 is the one most people carry, and it typically shows up around the mouth as cold sores. HSV-2 more usually establishes itself genitally.
That is a tendency, not a law. Either type can settle in either place. HSV-1 acquired genitally — commonly through oral sex — is now a substantial share of new genital herpes diagnoses in many places. The virus does not know which part of the body carries social meaning.
One practical difference worth knowing: genital HSV-1 tends to recur less often than genital HSV-2. If you are told which type you have, that is roughly what it tells you — something about likely frequency, and nothing at all about you.
Side by side.
- Most commonly oral — cold sores on or around the lip border.
- Very widespread. A large proportion of adults carry it, most having acquired it in childhood through ordinary non-sexual contact.
- Can be passed to the genitals through oral sex.
- When genital, tends to recur less frequently.
- Most commonly genital.
- Passed through skin-to-skin sexual contact.
- Tends to recur more often than genital HSV-1, particularly in the first year or two.
- Recurrences usually become less frequent over time.
Both are lifelong. Neither is curable. Both are managed with the same family of antiviral medicines, and both become less disruptive for most people as the years pass.
A cold sore is a herpes infection. Nobody treats it like one.
Cold sores are caused by herpes simplex. They are bought over the counter without embarrassment, mentioned in passing at work, and treated as an ordinary nuisance of being a person.
The same virus family, a few inches lower, becomes something people rehearse telling a partner about for weeks.
That gap is not medical. There is no clinical reason for one to be a shrug and the other to be a crisis. It is a difference in reputation, assembled fairly recently and maintained mostly by silence. Noticing the double standard is, for a lot of people, the moment the weight starts to lift.
Shingles is a herpes virus, and it is not this one.
Search for "herpes" and shingles comes back with it, because shingles is caused by herpes zoster — the varicella-zoster virus, the same one responsible for chickenpox. It belongs to the herpes family by name and by biology, and it has nothing to do with genital herpes or cold sores.
The distinguishing feature is the pattern. Shingles reactivates along a single nerve, so it appears as a band or stripe on one side of the body and characteristically stops at the midline. Herpes simplex does not do that.
If you have a painful band of blisters across one side of your torso, face or buttock, that is a reason to be seen promptly — shingles is treated most effectively early, and it is a different conversation from this one.
Which type you have matters less than you would expect.
It shapes how often you are likely to get outbreaks. It does not change the treatment options, and it does not change anything about you.
This page is educational and is not medical advice. Typing is done through testing, not from symptoms. If you have symptoms now, contact a sexual health clinic or NHS 111.
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- World Health Organization. Herpes simplex virus (fact sheet), 2020 estimates. www.who.int
- NHS. Genital herpes. www.nhs.uk
- Patel R et al. British Association of Sexual Health and HIV UK national guideline for the management of anogenital herpes, 2024. Int J STD AIDS. pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
Last checked 10 August 2026. Read our editorial policy for how we source and review these pages.