How to Wear Your Engagement Ring and Wedding Ring - Left or Right?

This is a simple question, but, getting engaged and married is an extremely emotional and exciting tradition.  With this tradition, there is certain etiquette to be followed and a question we get asked often is “How do I wear my engagement ring- Left or Right? and how about wedding band? There are many traditions associated with how you place your engagement rings and wedding bands on your hands before the wedding, the day of the wedding and after the wedding. Your first ring is a promise of marriage. The second solidifies the promise. Sometimes knowing which one goes where can be a bit confusing.

In Europe engagement ring is worn on the right hand

The question of whether an engagement ring should be worn on the right or left hand is anything but simple to answer. As the name implies, an engagement ring should be worn on the ring finger - this is a matter of general agreement. But should it be worn on the ring finger of the right or left hand? That depends entirely on the country. In Germany and the majority of other countries, the engagement ring is traditionally worn on the left hand. The right hand is reserved for the wedding ring in Germany and Austria, whereas most other countries have a different custom: in Switzerland, Southern European countries and the USA wedding rings are worn on the left hand. After the wedding, the engagement ring is often simply changed over to the right hand in those countries, resulting in the reverse of the German habit.

It is therefore not easy to find the 'right' answer to the question. The tendency, in Germany at least, is to wear the engagement ring on the left hand and the wedding ring on the right. But whether you decide to wear your engagement ring on your left or right hand is, at least partly, a matter of personal choice. An engagement ring, whether it is worn on the left or right hand, remains a very special and highly personal piece of jewellery, and the most beautiful declaration of love in the world.