ABSTRACT This paper compares data on gay men and lesbians’ sexual life courses in Italy from repeated cross-sectional surveys in 1995–1996 and 2012–2013. Gay men and lesbians increasingly experience sexual developmental milestones at similar ages and rates across the gender divide. They decreasingly experience their first coming out and first same-sex sexual contact in conventionally gendered situations. The number of lesbians’ sexual partners rises towards that of gay men’s. Sexual exclusivity spreads in gay and lesbian couples and the places were gay men and lesbians meet sexual partners consistently differ, but gendered trends point to common underlying norms. Growing similarities in gay and lesbian sexual experience across the gender divide suggest that, in line with on-going transformations in the meanings of sexuality in contemporary Italy, norms centred on relational preoccupations and sexual pleasure spread at the expense of the once hegemonic procreational and naturalised perspective on sexuality.