164 Love Quotes For When You're Truly Smitten

Fit for any occasion, these famous phrases will help put your feelings into words.
The Best Love Quotes
Photo: Getty Images; Design: Natalie Romine
Jamie Cuccinelli the knot writer and wedding expert
by
Jamie Cuccinelli
Jamie Cuccinelli the knot writer and wedding expert
Jamie Cuccinelli
Senior Editor, Sex & Relationships
  • Jamie is a Senior Editor for The Knot where she oversees all sex and relationship editorial content.
  • Before joining The Knot Worldwide, she worked with an array of digital publications that include Brides, The Zoe Report, Bustle and MyDomaine.
  • Jamie graduated with a degree in English and Media, Culture & Communications from New York University.
Updated May 16, 2024

Whether you're composing a handwritten love letter to your partner, writing your wedding vows or just looking to surprise your love with a heartful text, reading over some pre-penned love quotes could be just the inspiration you need. Fortunately for you, we've curated a lengthy list of our favorite love quotes that can help you put your feelings into words.

Ready to read over our favorite famous quotes about love? (We recommend having some tissues handy, TBH.) From thoughtfully written romantic I love you quotes to funny love quotes that'll make them LOL through the sentimental tears, see the best love quotes straight from the pros—i.e. musicians, movies, Disney media, Shakespeare and more—below.

Love quotes in this article: Best | Short | Romantic | Cute | Funny | Inspirational | Bible | World Religions | Famous | Shakespeare | Disney | Love Song | Sexy

Best Love Quotes

Love Quotes - Best Love Quote by Herman Hesse
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Sure it may be a little subjective—but aren't we the experts on all things love here? From deep love quotes that are total tearjerkers to the most swoon-worthy sayings, here are (in our opinion!) the best love quotes out there.

  • "You do not have to be good. You do not have to walk on your knees for a hundred miles through the desert repenting. You only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves." —Mary Oliver, "Wild Geese"
  • "I love you. I've loved you since the first moment I saw you. I guess maybe I've even loved you before I saw you." —A Place in the Sun
  • "I would have really liked just doing laundry and taxes with you." —Everything Everywhere All At Once
  • "Love is composed of a single soul inhabiting two bodies." —Aristotle
  • "If I know what love is, it is because of you." —Herman Hesse, Narcissus and Goldmund
  • "If one day the moon calls you by your name don't be surprised, because every night I tell her about you." —Shahrazad al-Khalij
  • "I would rather share one lifetime with you than face all the ages of this world alone." —J.R.R. Tolkien
  • "Deep within us—no matter who we are—there lives a feeling of wanting to be lovable, of wanting to be the kind of person that others like to be with. And the greatest thing we can do is to let people know that they are loved and capable of loving." —Fred Rogers
  • "It's you. It's me. It's us." —The Haunting of Bly Manor

Short Love Quotes

Love Quotes - Short Love Quotes
Design: Natalie Romine

Sometimes brevity is key. These short quotes about love prove that just a few words can say everything. (Pro tip: Jot one of these short love quotes down on a scrap of paper and leave it under the pillow of your partner, or hide them around the house. Short I love you quotes are also ideal for texts, BTW.)

  • "I love you and I like you." —Parks and Recreation
  • "I hope it's okay if I love you forever." —A Star Is Born
  • "For small creatures such as we, the vastness is bearable only through love." —Carl Sagan
  • "Nobody has ever measured, not even poets, how much the heart can hold." —Zelda Fitzgerald
  • "Love me—that's all I ask of you." —Phantom of the Opera
  • "If you were in an accident, I wouldn't stop for red lights." —The West Wing
  • "Love is a friendship set to music." —Joseph Campbell
  • "Who, being loved, is poor?" —Oscar Wilde
  • "True love is inexhaustible. The more you give, the more you have." —Antoine De Saint-Exupery
  • "To me you are perfect." —Love Actually
  • "It doesn't make you weak to love someone." —Bros

Romantic Love Quotes

Love Quotes - Romantic Love Quotes
Design: Falak Khoja

Pour on the passion and go all out with these romantic love quotes. From poems to current pop culture (we see you, Evelyn Hugo), these romantic love quotes are just the thing to help you express your head-over-heels emotions.

  • "Love is the longing for the half of ourselves we have lost." —Milan Kundera, The Unbearable Lightness of Being
  • "But if you think there's any chance that I could make you happy, I wish you would let me try. Because it's the only thing I really want to do with my life." —Sally Rooney, Beautiful World, Where Are You
  • "But in a solitary life, there are rare moments when another soul dips near yours, as stars once a year brush the earth. Such a constellation was he to me." —Madeline Miller, Circe
  • "I'm not a religious person but I do sometimes think God made you for me." —Sally Rooney, Normal People
  • "Love is a quiet, reassuring, relaxing, pottering, pedantic, harmonious hum of a thing; something you can easily forget is there, even though its palms are outstretched beneath you in case you fall." —Dolly Alderton, Everything I Know About Love: A Memoir
  • "If you are intolerable, let me be the one to tolerate you," I said, and then I kissed her and tasted the lemon juice on her lips." —Taylor Jenkins Reid, The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo
  • "If I never see you again I will always carry you inside, outside; on my fingertips and at brain edges and in centers centers of what I am of what remains." —Charles Bukowski, Living on Luck
  • "Just in case you ever foolishly forget, I'm never not thinking of you." —Virginia Woolf, Selected Diaries
  • "I swear I couldn't love you more than I do right now; yet I know I will tomorrow." ― Leo Christopher

Cute Love Quotes

Love Quotes - Cute Love Quotes
Design: Natalie Romine

Perfect for couples who are currently dating (or longtime loves just looking for some lighthearted turns of phrase), these cute love quotes couldn't possibly be any sweeter. For something special to wake up to, type out one of these cute love quotes to send to your partner in the a.m.

  • "5, 6, 7, 8; I want you to be my mate. 1, 2, 3, 4; You're the one that I adore." —But I'm a Cheerleader
  • "When you're a kid, you assume your parents are soulmates. My kids are gonna be right about that." —The Office
  • "True love is singing karaoke 'Under Pressure' and letting the other person sing the Freddie Mercury part." —Mindy Kaling
  • "You're my one in five billion." —The X-Files
  • "In case I forget to tell you later, I had a really good time tonight." —Pretty Woman
  • "You know you're in love when you can't fall asleep because reality is finally better than your dreams." —Dr. Seuss
  • "Happiness is anyone and anything at all that's loved by you." —You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown
  • "Maybe you don't need the whole world to love you, you know. Maybe you just need one person." —The Muppets
  • "Once upon a time there was a boy who loved a girl, and her laughter was a question he wanted to spend his whole life answering." —Nicole Krauss, The History of Love

Funny Love Quotes

Love Quotes - Funny Love Quotes
Design: Natalie Romine

If one of the things you love most about your partner is their sense of humor, funny love quotes will be right up their alley. After all, is there anything more special than laughing until you cry with the one you love? Below, find funny love quotes that serve as a sweet, tender way to share your emotions without being heavy-handed.

  • "It wasn't love at first sight. It took a full five minutes." —Lucille Ball
  • "I love being married. It's so great to find that one special person you want to annoy for the rest of your life. " —Rita Rudner
  • "Love is a two-way street constantly under construction." —Carroll Bryant
  • "The first draft of my vows, which I wrote the day after we got engaged, clocked in at around 70 pages." —Parks and Recreation
  • "Honestly, if you're not willing to sound stupid, you don't deserve to be in love." —A Lot Like Love
  • "I'm looking for someone to share in an adventure that I'm arranging, and it's very difficult to find anyone." —J.R.R. Tolkien, The Hobbit
  • "At the touch of love everyone becomes a poet." —Plato
  • "Love is sharing your popcorn." —Charles Schultz
  • "I'm in lesbians with you." —Scott Pilgrim vs. the World
  • "Since I've met you, I haven't listened to one ABBA song. That's because now my life's as good as an ABBA song. It's as good as 'Dancing Queen.'" —Muriel's Wedding

Inspirational Love Quotes

Love Quotes - Inspiration Love Quotes
Design: Natalie Romine

Love is powerful and can motivate, heal and inspire. These can't-miss inspirational love quotes are the perfect addition to an anniversary card, your wedding vows or just because.

  • "Love is the condition in which the happiness of another person is essential to your own." —Robert A. Heinlein, Stranger in a Strange Land
  • "There is no remedy for love, but to love more." —Henry David Thoreau
  • "There's only one thing that cuts through all our realities and that's love—the bridge between all our differences." —The L Word
  • "All, everything that I understand, I understand only because I love." —Leo Tolstoy, War and Peace
  • "Because through love, we feel the intensity of our connection to everything and everyone. And at the core we are all the same. We're all one." —Loving Annabelle
  • "Love is the only force capable of transforming an enemy into a friend." —Martin Luther King, Jr.
  • "Absence is to love what wind is to fire; it extinguishes the small, it enkindles the great." —Roger de Rabutin
  • "If you find me not within you, you will never find me. For I have been with you, from the beginning of me." —Rumi
  • "In all the world, there is no heart for me like yours. In all the world, there is no love for you like mine." —Maya Angelou
  • "The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched. They must be felt with the heart." —Helen Keller
  • "Love has nothing to do with what you are expecting to get—only with what you are expecting to give—which is everything." —Katharine Hepburn, Me: Stories of My Life

Bible Love Quotes

Love Quotes - Bible Love Quote Romans 12:10
Design: Falak Khoja

Whether you're looking for a Bible love quote for a religious occasion or you're exploring love and faith in your own life, these Bible quotes about love are a beautiful place to start. You can also find more Bible verses about love here.

  • "Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres." —1 Corinthians 13:4-7
  • "Be devoted to one another in love. Honor one another above yourselves." —Romans 12:10
  • "But Ruth said, 'Do not urge me to leave you or turn back from following you; for where you go, I will go, and where you lodge, I will lodge. Your people shall be my people, and your God, my God.'" —Ruth 1:16
  • "Don't just pretend to love others. Really love them. Hate what is wrong. Hold tightly to what is good. Love each other with genuine affection, and take delight in honoring each other." —Romans 12:9-15
  • "There is no fear in love, but perfect love drives out fear, because fear involves punishment. The one who fears has not been perfected in love." —1 John 4:18
  • "Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love." —Ephesians 4:2

World Religions Love Quotes

Love Quotes - World Religions Love Quotes
Design: Falak Khoja

Every religion has something to say about love. For those who want to find love through their own faith or explore the teachings of other traditions, these love quotes are worth studying. Though they come from different faith leaders, from different parts of the world, and through the millennia, these sayings show that love is a common language to all.

  • "Love is the absence of judgement." —Dalai Lama
  • "The way is not in the sky. The way is in the heart." —Buddha
  • "Where there is love there is life." —Mahatma Gandhi
  • "And of His signs is that He created for you from yourselves mates that you may find tranquility in them; and He placed between you affection and mercy. Indeed in that are signs for a people who give thought." —Qur'an, Surah Ar-Rum - 21
  • "Let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth, for your love is better than wine." —King Solomon, Song of Songs 1:2
  • "Radiate boundless love towards the entire world—above, below, and across—unhindered, without ill will, without enmity." —Buddha
  • "Love and compassion are the true religions to me. But to develop this, we do not need to believe in any religion" —Dalai Lama
  • "A husband and wife are one soul, separated only through their descent to this world. When they are married, they are reunited again." —Zohar, 191a
  • "Love is a gift of one's inner most soul to another so both can be whole." —Buddha
  • A man should eat and drink less than his means, clothes himself according to his means, and honor his wife and children beyond his means." —Talmud, Chullin 84b

Famous Love Quotes

Love Quotes
Design: Natalie Romine

These famous love quotes are beloved for a reason. From Pride and Prejudice to When Harry Met Sally, these famous quotes about love are likely ones you know and adore—though we're sure you'll discover some new favorites, too!

  • "What do you want? You want the moon? Just say the word and I'll throw a lasso around it and pull it down." —It's a Wonderful Life
  • "You have bewitched me, body and soul." —Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice
  • "Do all lovers feel they're inventing something?" —Portrait of a Lady on Fire
  • "If I loved you less, I might be able to talk about it more." —Emma
  • "It was a million tiny little things that, when you added them all up, they meant we were supposed to be together, and I knew it. I knew it the first time I touched her. It was like coming home, only to no home I'd ever known. I was just taking her hand to help her out of a car and I knew it. It was like magic." —Sleepless in Seattle
  • "When you realize you want to spend the rest of your life with somebody, you want the rest of your life to start as soon as possible." —When Harry Met Sally
  • "Call me by your name, and I'll call you by mine." —Call Me By Your Name
  • "Swoon. I'll catch you." —The English Patient
  • "I want all of you, forever, you and me, every day." —Nicholas Sparks, The Notebook
  • "You had me at 'hello.'" —Jerry Maguire
  • "You don't marry someone you can live with, you marry the person you cannot live without." —P.S. I Love You
  • "It seems right now that all I've ever done in my life is making my way here to you." —Bridges of Madison County
  • "I wish I had done everything on earth with you." —F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby
  • "In my opinion, the best thing you can do is find someone who loves you for exactly what you are. Good mood, bad mood, ugly, pretty, handsome, what have you." —Juno
  • "I've come here with no expectations, only to profess, now that I am at liberty to do so, that my heart is, and always will be, yours." —Sense and Sensibility
  • "It's like in that moment the whole universe existed just to bring us together." —Serendipity
  • "If you love someone, set them free. If they come back they're yours; if they don't they never were." —Richard Bach

Shakespeare Love Quotes

Love Quotes
Design: Natalie Romine

If you want to dazzle your partner with some of the most poetic sentiments around, then trust the bard. These William Shakespeare love quotes will take your beloved's breath away.

  • "Love is not love which alters when it alteration finds, or bends with the remover to remove. O no! it is an ever-fixed mark, that looks on tempests and is never shaken." —"Sonnet 116"
  • "Doubt thou the stars are fire. Doubt that the sun doth move. Doubt truth to be a liar. But never doubt I love." —Hamlet
  • "I do love nothing in the world so well as you." —Much Ado About Nothing
  • "Love looks not with the eyes but with the mind." —A Midsummer Night's Dream
  • "Hear my soul speak. Of the very instant that I saw you, did my heart fly at your service." —The Tempest
  • "Love comforteth like sunshine after rain." —"Venus and Adonis"
  • "I love you with so much of my heart that none is left to protest." —Much Ado About Nothing

Disney Love Quotes

Love Quotes
Design: Natalie Romine

From Dory's tearjerking "I look at you and I'm home," to The Incredibles' "You are my greatest adventure," our favorite Disney love quotes are nostalgic and oh-so-sweet.

  • "My dream wouldn't be complete without you in it." —The Princess and the Frog
  • "Some people are worth melting for." —Frozen
  • "It's enough for this restless wanderer just to be with you." —The Lion King
  • "I look at you, and I'm home." —Finding Nemo
  • "All at once everything looks different, now that I see you." —Tangled
  • "Love is a song that never ends." —Bambi
  • "You mean more to me than anyone in this whole world." —Peter Pan
  • "You are my greatest adventure." —The Incredibles
  • "One song, my heart keeps singing, of one love only for you." —Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs
  • "I'd rather die tomorrow than live a hundred years without knowing you." —Pocahontas
  • "Love is an open door." —Frozen
  • "Yes, you'll be in my heart. From this day on, now and forever more." —Tarzan
  • "So this is love. So this is what makes life divine." —Cinderella
  • "Each happy ending's a brand new beginning." —Enchanted
  • "Any day spent with you is my favorite day." —Winnie the Pooh
  • "People always do crazy things when they're in love." —Hercules
  • "For it is plain as anyone can see, we're simply meant to be." —The Nightmare Before Christmas
  • "To face the future with another, who means more than any other, is to be loved." —The Rescuers

Love Song Quotes

Love Quotes
Design: Natalie Romine

Leave it to the likes of Taylor Swift, Hozier, Etta James, Billie Holiday and more. Cue up these love song quotes below. (And, if you happen to be wedding planning, these love song quotes might just inspire your first dance select.)

  • "You, you make loving fun. And I don't have to tell you, but you're the only one." —Fleetwood Mac, "You Make Loving Fun"
  • "The only heaven I'll be sent to is when I'm alone with you." —Hozier, "Take Me to Church"
  • "Open your door, I'll be your tenant. Don't got much baggage to lay at your feet. But sweet kisses, I've got to spare. I'll be there, and I'll cover you" —RENT, "I'll Cover You"
  • "My heart's been borrowed and yours has been blue. All's well that ends well to end up with you." —Taylor Swift, "Lover"
  • "I've loved her in secret. I've loved her out loud." —The Highwomen, "If She Ever Leaves Me"
  • "You know I dreamed about you for twenty-nine years before I saw you. You know I dreamed about you. I missed you for, for twenty-nine years." —"Slow Show, "The National
  • "I never get bored of lookin' at you 'cause every time I see somethin' new." —girl in red, "Watch You Sleep"
  • "Don't read the last page. But I stay when you're lost, and I'm scared, and you're turning away. I want your midnights. But I'll be cleaning up bottles with you on New Year's Day." —Taylor Swift, "New Year's Day"
  • "Things will come out right now, we can make it so. Someone is on your side. No one is alone." —Into the Woods, "No One Is Alone"
  • "Are the stars out tonight? I don't know if it's cloudy or bright. I only have eyes for you, dear." —The Flamingos, "I Only Have Eyes for You"
  • "I see your face in every flower, your eyes in stars above. It's just the thought of you; the very thought of you, my love." —Nat King Cole, "The Very Thought of You"
  • "I feel safe when you're holding me near. Love the way that you conquer your fear. You know hearts don't break around here." — Ed Sheeren, "Hearts Don't Break Around Here"
  • "Don't promise me fair sky above. Don't promise me kind road below. Just walk beside me, love, any way the wind blows." —Hadestown, "Promises"
  • "I believe in dreams again. I believe that love will never end. And like the river finds the sea, I was lost. Now I'm free, 'cause I believe in you and me." —Whitney Houston, "I Believe in You and Me"
  • "Two hearts that beat as one; our lives have just begun" —Lionel Richie feat. Diana Ross, "Endless Love"
  • "If you say run, I'll run with you. And if you say hide, we'll hide. Because my love for you would break my heart in two if you should fall into my arms and tremble like a flower." —David Bowie, "Let's Dance"
  • "When I first saw you, I saw love. And the first time you touched me, I felt love. And after all this time, you're still the one I love." —Shania Twain, "You're Still the One"
  • "'Cause even when there is no star in sight, you'll always be my only guiding light." —Mumford & Sons, "Guiding Light"
  • "We'll lay here for years or for hours, your hand in my hand, so still and discreet." —Hozier, "In a Week"
  • "And if you ever forget how much you really mean to me, every day I will remind you." —Bruno Mars, "Count on Me"
  • "If not for you, my sky would fall. Rain would gather, too. Without your love, I'd be nowhere at all. I'd be lost, if not for you." —Bob Dylan, "If Not for You"
  • "That's what happens when innocent friends turn serious lovers. And we're so happy that we've fallen in love and still can be best of friends." —Whitney Houston, "We Didn't Know"
  • "Yours is the first face that I saw. I think I was blind before I met you. Now I don't know where I am, I don't know where I've been, but I know where I want to go." —Bright Eyes, "First Day of My Life"
  • "You're the best friend that I ever had. I've been with you such a long time. You're my sunshine and I want you to know." —Queen, "You're My Best Friend"
  • "It's very clear. Our love is here to stay. Not for a year, but ever and a day." —Billie Holiday, "Our Love Is Here to Stay"
  • "Close your eyes and I'll kiss you. Tomorrow I'll miss you. Remember I'll always be true. And then while I'm away, I'll write home everyday. And I'll send all my loving to you." —The Beatles, "All My Loving"
  • "And if heaven and hell decide that they both are satisfied, illuminate the no's on their vacancy signs; if there's no one beside you when your soul embarks then I'll follow you into the dark." —Death Cab for Cutie, "I Will Follow You Into the Dark"
  • "Take my hand. Take my whole life, too. For I can't help falling in love with you." —Elvis Presley, "Can't Help Falling in Love"
  • "At last, my love has come along. My lonely days are over and life is like a song." —Etta James, "At Last"
  • "Never knew the best was yet to come. Life began when I saw your face, and I hear your laugh like a serenade." —The Chicks, "Lullaby"
  • "And in this crazy life and through these crazy times, it's you, it's you. You make me sing. You're every line, you're every word, you're everything." —Michael Bublé, "Everything"
  • "The greatest thing you'll ever learn is just to love and be loved in return." —Nat King Cole, "Nature Boy"
  • "Lying in your arms, could be Jupiter or Mars. You say I hang the stars in your eyes, but you put the universe in mine." —Kelsea Ballerini, "Universe"
  • "Now everybody asks me why I'm smiling out from ear to ear." —Beyoncé, "Love on Top"
  • "Isn't it just so pretty to think all along there was some invisible string tying you to me?" —Taylor Swift, "invisible string"
  • "It feels like springtime in winter; it feels like Christmas in June. It feels like heaven has opened up it's gates for me and you." —Babyface feat. Mariah Carey, "Everytime I Close My Eyes"
  • "Through weakness and strength, happiness and sorrow, for better, for worse; I will love you with every beat of my heart." —Shania Twain, "From This Moment On"
  • "From here on after, let's stay the way we are right now; And share all the love and laughter that a lifetime will allow." —George Strait, "I Cross My Heart"
  • "Be a best friend, tell the truth and overuse 'I love you.'" —Lee Brice, "Love Like Crazy"
  • 'Lonely days of uncertainty, they disappear when you're near me, when you're around my life's worthwhile, and now I long to see you smile." —Big Star, "My Life is Right"
  • "I can't do everything, but I'd do anything for you. I can't do anything except be in love with you." —Dire Straits, "Romeo and Juliet"

Sexy Love Quotes

Love Quotes - Sexy Love Quotes
Design: Falak Khoja

Ready to turn up the heat? Sexy love quotes may not be ideal for public declarations of love (i.e. your wedding vows), but they could be just the thing to kick off a sultry night in with your partner.

  • "Beneath the chandelier of stars and atmosphere, tangled like the roots on the ground. The windows opened up, the wind is blowing and we're both not making a sound. It's like I'm melting on into you." —Taylor Swift, "This Is Really Happening"
  • "Only the united beat of sex and the heart can create ecstasy." —Anaïs Nin
  • "Any man who can drive safely while kissing a pretty girl is simply not giving the kiss the attention it deserves." ―Albert Einstein
  • "You turned my bed into a sacred oasis," —Taylor Swift, "Dancing With Our Hands Tied"
  • "We lie in each other's arms eyes shut and fingers open and all the colors of the world pass through our bodies like strings of fire." —Marge Piercy
  • "Please never forget that the sun rises and sets with your smile. At least to me it does. You're the only thing on this planet worth worshipping." —Taylor Jenkins Reid, The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo

Contributions by Kathleen McCann

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