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Male components insert into female components

In electrical and mechanical trades and manufacturing, each half of a pair of mating connectors or fasteners is conventionally assigned the designation male or female. The female connector is generally a receptacle that receives and holds the male connector. Alternative terminology such as plug and socket or jack are sometimes used, particularly for electrical connectors. The assignment is a direct analogy with male and female genitalia, the part bearing one or more protrusions or which fits inside the other being designated male, in contrast to the part containing the corresponding indentations, or fitting outside the other, being designated female. Extension of the analogy results in the verb to mate being used to describe the process of connecting two corresponding parts together. In some cases (notably electrical power connectors), the gender of connectors is selected according to rigid rules, to enforce a sense of one way directionality (e. g. a flow of power from one device to another). This gender distinction is implemented to enhance safety or ensure proper functionality by preventing unsafe or non functional configurations from being set up. In terms of mathematical graph theory, an electrical power distribution network made up of plugs and sockets is a directed tree, with the directionality arrows corresponding to the female to male transfer of electrical power through each mated connection. This is an example where male and female connectors have been deliberately designed and assigned to physically enforce a safe network topology. In other contexts, such as plumbing, one way flow is not enforced through connector gender assignment. Flows through piping networks can be bidirectional, as in underground water distribution networks which have designed in redundancy. In plumbing situations where one way flow is desired, it is implemented through other means (e. g. air gaps or one way check valves), and not through male female gender schemes.

The Talmud describes arrow heads and mating shafts as potentially being either male or female, depending on their construction, i. e. a prong on a male arrow head fits into a hollowed out shaft and vice versa. This is owing to a prohibition on a female shaft, from its susceptibility as a receptacle for impurity, for use as s'chach
18th century dictionaries and encyclopedias mention male and female screws or cochleae. A 1736 builder's manual mentions screw genders as metaphors for convex and concave shapes:If the furrowed surface be convex, 'tis called a Male Screw; if concave, a Female; and where Motion is to be generated, the Male and Female are always join'd.

In mechanical design, the prototypical "male" component is a threaded bolt, but an alignment post, a mounting boss, or a sheet metal tab connector can also be considered as male. Correspondingly, a threaded nut, an alignment hole, a mounting recess, or sheet metal slot connector is considered to be female. While some mechanical designs are "one off" custom setups not intended to be repeated, there is an entire fastener industry devoted to manufacturing mass produced or semi custom components. To avoid unnecessary confusion, conventional definitions of fastener gender have been defined and agreed upon.

Although this aspect is not highlighted in their promotional literature, several common construction toys embody gendered (and in some cases, genderless) mechanical interconnections. This should not be surprising, since these toys feature the nearly infinite flexibility and versatility of shape that a modular interconnect architecture can enable. Mathematicians have begun to classify well known construction sets using group theory to study the combinatoric possibilities of structures that can be built. For example, the canonical LEGO plastic blocks have "female" indentations on the lower surface, and "male" bosses or protrusions on the upper surfaces. Meccano and Erector have many gendered connections, starting with the nut and bolt fasteners they use frequently. Stickle bricks, using interlocking plastic protrusions, are effectively genderless. Lincoln logs use a very simple form of genderless connections. Kapla or KEVA planks are extremely simple genderless systems interconnected only by gravity.

Downspouts (also called downpipes, rain conductors, or leaders) are used to convey rainwater from roof gutters to the ground through hollow pipes or tubes. These tubes usually come in sections, joined by inserting the male end (often crimped with a special tool to slightly reduce its size) into the female end of the next section. These connections are usually not sealed or caulked, instead relying on gravity to move the rainwater from the male end and into the receiving female connection located directly below.

Sheet metal ductwork for conveying air in HVAC systems typically uses gendered connections. Typically, the airflow through a ductwork connection is from male to female. However, since one way flow is implemented by forced air fans or blowers, "backwards" gendered connections can be seen frequently in some systems, since all connections are typically sealed with duct sealing mastic or tape to prevent leakage anyway. The flow convention is usually loosely adhered to for simplicity of design, and to reduce the number of gender changer fittings required, but exceptions are made whenever expedient.

Although the gender of tubing and plumbing fittings is usually obvious, this may not be true of electrical connectors because of their more complex and varying constructions. Instead, connector gender is conventionalized and thus can be somewhat obscure to the uninitiated. For example, the female D subminiature connector body projects outward from the mounting plane of the chassis, and this protrusion could be erroneously construed as male. Instead, the "maleness" of the D subminiature connectors is defined by specific presence of male pins, rather than by the protrusion of the connector (this is also true for many other pin based connectors like XLR). The male/female distinction is more obvious with ring crimp lug connectors which are placed around a screw post, but again with spade or split ring crimp lug connectors the end alone is not obviously female. Further confusion can be caused by the term "jack", which is used for both female and male connectors and typically refers to the fixed (panel) side of a connector pair. IEEE STD 100, IEEE 315 1975 and IEEE 200 1975 (replaced by ASME Y14.44 2008) define "plug" and "jack" by location or mobility, rather than gender. A connector in a fixed location is a "jack", and a moveable connector is a "plug". Cost and reliability considerations probably drove the design decision to use female jack connectors on many computer terminals (and some personal computers) for the serial port, despite being in direct violation of the connector gender convention explicitly specified in the RS 232 standard for "DTE" (data terminal equipment) connections. This confusing reversal of the RS 232 connector gender convention has caused many hours of frustration for ill informed end users, as they tried to troubleshoot non functional serial port equipment connections.

In electrical connections where voltage or current is sufficient to cause injury, the part permanently connected to the power source is invariably female, with concealed contacts, to prevent inadvertent touching of live conductors by people or animals, or by conductive items that may cause a short circuit. A male plug, with fully exposed protruding contacts, is installed on the cord of (or directly onto) the device receiving the power. Devices that need to be robust against mechanical damage may use a special male IEC 60320 C14 connector (see above), which is recessed below the surface of a mounting panel, providing the desired physical protection while conforming to safety regulations. In the case of consumer level AC power, connector gender is used to implicitly enforce safe use of power connectors. Because of this consideration, it is illegal under electrical code to make or use any gender changers to connect AC line power to consumer level equipment. A double ended male connector for utility supplied ("mains") electrical power is extremely dangerous, and sometimes is called a suicide cable or widowmaker cord. Some hardware shops explicitly refuse to make or sell them when asked by customers who have mistakenly hung a string of Christmas lights backwards and wish to connect the socket end to a wall socket, or who intend to connect a generator or inverter to their home's electrical circuit in the event of a utility power outage. Similarly, an exposed connection on a jumper cable for a 12V automotive battery can be hazardous, because of the potentially high current and energy involved. Accidental shorting of the wire to vehicle ground can cause sparks, rapid heating, or even a battery explosion. In low voltage use such as for data communications, electrical shock hazard is not an issue, and male or female connectors are used based on other engineering factors such as convenience of use, cost, or ease of manufacturing. For example, the common "patch cables" used for Ethernet (and the similar cords used for telephones) typically have male modular plugs on both ends, to connect to jacks on equipment or mounted in walls. An example of a design tradeoff in power connector selection is a coaxial power connector, which is usually set up so that power is fed from the female plug into the male jack (which is typically a part of the electronic device accepting the power). Although the plug is female, with a partially recessed center contact, it is still possible for casual accidental contact with a metallic object to short circuit the power source. Depending on the design of the power adapter, it may react to a short circuit by shutting down temporarily, or instead by blowing out an internal safety fuse. In this example, the marginal reliability of the connector choice was deemed to be acceptable by the equipment designer, since the power adapter supplies low voltage that does not pose an electric shock hazard. The potential fire hazard from accidental short circuiting is addressed by the internal safety fuse, although this requires that a failed power adapter be completely replaced. In a different design, if the power adapter were intended to supply a voltage sufficient to cause electrical shock, the semi exposed center contact of the female plug would be considered unacceptably hazardous, requiring a different choice of connector.

Some electrical connectors are hermaphroditic because they include both male and female elements in a single unit intended to interconnect freely, without regard for gender. See the discussion of genderless connectors in this article for more detailed information. As an additional complication, certain electronic connector designs may incorporate combinations of male and female pins in a single connector body, for mating with a complementary connector with opposite gender pins in corresponding positions. In these unusual cases, gender is often defined by the shape of the connector body, rather than the mixed gender connector pins and sockets. These types of connectors are not strictly speaking hermaphroditic, since mating connectors are not freely interchangeable. An informal term that has been used for these connectors is "bisexual", in addition to the more official terminology, mixed gender. Thus, for example, one can have a mixed gender female plug that connects to a mixed gender male jack (though a reversed gender assignment of connectors would be a more typical design choice in this example). Male connector pins are often protected by a shell (also called a shroud, surround, or shield), which may envelop the entire female connector when mated. RF connectors often have multiple layers of interlocking shells to properly connect the shields of coaxial and triaxial cable. In such cases, the gender is assigned based on the innermost connecting point. With the exception of reverse polarity BNC or TNC, where the outer shell determines the gender and the innermost connecting points are opposite to a standard connector, for example a female RP TNC connector has a solid innermost pin. Another ambiguous situation arises with the connectors used for USB, FireWire (IEEE 1394), HDMI, and Thunderbolt serial data bus connections. Close examination of these connectors reveals that the contact "pins" are not actually pins, but instead are conductive surfaces that slide past each other when they mate. Therefore, the traditional pin and socket nomenclature is not applicable. Instead, most computer hardware people fall back to referring to the wrap around metal shield on the plug connector as if it were a connector pin. By this convention, the connectors on serial bus cables are "male plugs", and the corresponding connectors on equipment are "female jacks". A casual glance at a USB "Type A" plug connector may give the false impression that it is hermaphroditic. However, a physical attempt to mate two USB "Type A" cables with each other reveals the fact that the connectors will not interconnect. Classifying according to mathematical graph theory, USB buses are directed trees, whereas FireWire buses have a true bus network topology. This difference is reflected in the bus connectors used, in that USB cables are asymmetrical (one end Type A, other end Type B) while FireWire cables may have identical connectors at both ends. The more recent USB C cables may also have identical connectors on both ends (in which case the logical A and B ends are negotiated between the attached devices rather than being directly indicated by the plugs). An example of a connector where the contacts themselves are hermaphroditic is the ELCO Varicon, wherein the contacts are bifurcated in recessed cross shaped wells, and mate with one another axially at a 90 degree rotation. In this example, the plugs have the contacts oriented transversely and the sockets are arranged longitudinally.

Devices used for mating two connectors of the same gender have a wide variety of terms, including for example: "gender changer", "gender mender", "gender bender", and "gender blender". A specific gender changer can be referred to by either the gender of its connectors, or the gender which it is designed to connect to, resulting in a thoroughly ambiguous terminology. Thus a "male gender changer" might have female connectors to mate two male ends, or male connectors to mate two female ends. Adding to this potential for confusion, some gender changers also combine additional functions such as cross over pin outs. Active cables may incorporate embedded systems for communications protocol or logic level changes, which technically makes them "adapters", but this distinction is sometimes neglected in marketing materials or common usage.