All About Carrie Bradshaw's Boyfriends on “Sex and the City” — and Who She Might End Up With!

From one-day flings to lasting love, Carrie Bradshaw had many swoon-worthy boyfriends

As the heroine of HBO's iconic series Sex and the City, Carrie Bradshaw’s love life is far from dull.

The 30-something Manhattanite’s weekly column chronicled her adventures in the search for romance, imparting plenty of life lessons along the way. “I’m looking for love. Real love,” Sarah Jessica Parker proclaimed in the role.

But, she didn’t find it easily — the storylines of most of Carrie's boyfriends didn’t extend beyond a single episode. After all, as the fictional writer famously said, “Some women aren’t meant to be tamed.”

Some of Carrie's boyfriends broke this mold though. Her relationships with financier John “Mr. Big” Preston, played by Chris Noth, and furniture designer Aidan Shaw (John Corbett) lasted far beyond the series, crossing over into the show’s subsequent movies and its 2021 spinoff, And Just Like That...

Related: Where Can I Watch Sex and the City? How to Stream the Original Show, Movies and Spinoff

Fans were particularly excited to see Aidan’s return to Carrie’s life after the shocking death of her fictional husband, Mr. Big.

Despite their happy reunion, however, Carrie said goodbye to Aidan once more at the end of season 2, leaving their future open-ended. But, series creator Michael Patrick King told The New York Times in June 2023, “I didn’t bring Aidan back to fail.”

From the early flings to her long-lasting connections, here’s a look back at Carrie Bradshaw’s dating history.

Jeremy

Long before she met Mr. Big or Aidan, Carrie was making out with Jeremy (David Duchovny) in front of her high school locker. “We were in a lip lock for most of 1982,” Jeremy once joked.

Though the pair were hot and heavy, with Jeremy promising that he’d always love Carrie in her yearbook, she eventually broke it off. “I thought, come on, there must be better guys out there — turns out, there aren’t!” she later lamented.

Jeremy moved to Denver and got married, but the former high school sweethearts reconnected after his divorce.

In season 6, Carrie’s friends were initially enthusiastic about their potential (“You’re marrying him!” Charlotte proclaimed), but their zealousness faded when Jeremy revealed he was in a therapeutic community to try to figure out why some things seemed to be harder for him than they were for other people.

Carrie commended him for seeking help, even visiting him at his facility, but they ultimately decided that they were in very different places in their lives and called it quits.

John “Mr. Big” Preston

John “Mr. Big” Preston was a wealthy entrepreneur and the love of Carrie’s life. Heralded as “the next Donald Trump,” only “younger and much better looking” by her pal Samantha, he met Carrie on the streets of New York after she collided with another pedestrian and spilled the entire contents of her purse — condoms included — onto the sidewalk.

Carrie and Big slept together on their first real date, kicking off what would turn out to be a lifelong love affair. It wasn’t without its bumps: They broke up after roughly a year when Big told her that she was not the one for him. Months later, however, their romance was rekindled when he sent Carrie flowers for her birthday.

While Big seemed more committed the second time around, even confessing his love for the columnist, she was left heartbroken and single once more after learning that he made plans to move to Paris for a year without her.

Although he didn't find business success in Paris, he did meet someone else — a 20-something named Natasha to whom he got engaged, and later married. Carrie tried to move on with her new love Aidan, but she and Big couldn’t stay away from each other and started an affair that ruined both of their relationships.

The pair remained friendly but distant in the wake of their scandal. Big moved to Napa, California, and Carrie pursued other romantic interests, moving to France with her boyfriend Aleksandr Petrovsky. Big followed her overseas to tell her she was the one but broke her heart for a third time on their wedding day when he failed to meet her at the altar.

Eventually, they found each other once more and had their happy ending: Carrie and Big tied the knot in an intimate courthouse wedding and lived together as husband and wife for 11 years before his untimely death.

Aidan Shaw

Aidan Shaw came into Carrie’s life at a complicated time, when she was still reeling from the news of Mr. Big’s engagement. The furniture designer and the columnist had a flirtatious exchange when they first met in his store.

The pair faced a series of roadblocks early on in their partnership. She was shy about the speed at which things were moving and began sleeping with Big behind Aidan’s back. When their affair was revealed, she and Aidan went their separate ways.

The pair got back together, but struggled to overcome trust issues and their differences in lifestyle: Aidan loved the country life while Carrie was committed to the big city.

Still, they gave things another try, with Aidan moving into Carrie’s brownstone apartment. She felt stifled by the lack of space, and though she initially accepted his marriage proposal, she broke his heart once more when she refused to elope with him. “If you don’t want to marry me right now, you’ll never want to marry me,” he told her.

Aidan moved on with a fellow furniture designer named Kathy, with whom he had three sons.

In the second Sex and the City movie, he and Carrie shared a steamy kiss upon running into each other on vacation in Dubai, but nothing came of their transgression, which she later confessed to her husband Big.

Years later, after Aidan divorced his wife and Mr. Big had died, the couple tried their hand at love once more, until Aidan decided he couldn’t spend so much time away from his sons. The season 2 finale of And Just Like That… left the couple’s future uncertain as Aidan said he needed at least five years away from the city to allow for his youngest child to grow up.

Ben

A political editor with a Tweety Bird tattoo, Ben, portrayed by Ian Kahn, met Carrie in classic New York fashion — sitting next to a fountain in Central Park. He broke the ice by asking her about her evening, which involved a bad date with a kleptomaniac. Though Ben had recently sworn off dating, he took a chance on Carrie.

Their biggest relationship milestone came when they set Miranda up with Ben’s friend, Luke, for a double date. “Nothing makes you feel like more of a ... couple than creating another ... couple,” Carrie mused of her new beau.

It turned out to be their downfall: Concerned that Luke’s uncouth behavior toward Miranda might be a reflection of her boyfriend’s own red flags, Carrie committed the cardinal dating sin of going through her boyfriend’s things. When he caught her red-handed, he pulled the plug on their romance.

Vaughn Wysel

Carrie and fellow writer Vaughn Wysel (Justin Theroux) first crossed paths at a PEN America luncheon. After a month of dating, Vaughn took her home to meet his family, whom she got on with famously. “The thing I like best about him is his family,” she told Samatha. “They’ve got charisma!”

Unfortunately, Carrie wasn’t as compatible with Vaughn sexually, and the couple threw in the towel on their relationship.

Patrick Casey

Richard Joseph Paul played Patrick, a movie composer and a recovering alcoholic. He and Carrie didn’t exactly have a meet-cute: Patrick was smoking in a doorway and flicked his cigarette into her path as she was walking down the street, hitting her in the arm and burning her.

All was forgiven after a shared cappuccino, however, and the two had a week-and-half courtship that revolved heavily around sex. “I think Patrick’s addicted to me,” she told Miranda. “It’s like he replaced drinking with me.”

Though Patrick professed his love for the show’s heroine, Carrie broke it off after he relapsed, showing up to her apartment heavily intoxicated and stripping down in the street.

He reached out to make amends after recommitting to his alcohol recovery program, but Carrie never saw him again.

Bill Kelley

Just a few weeks into her relationship with politician Bill Kelley, played by John Slattery, Carrie was hitting the campaign trail with him and dressing like a first lady.

All seemed to be going well, with Bill telling her that she was the first woman in a long time that he felt so intimate with. Things got a little too intimate for Carrie, though, particularly when he asked her to urinate on him in the shower.

Carrie refused and Bill promptly broke up with her, explaining that his team thought it was a bad idea for him to date a sex columnist so close to his election for city comptroller.

Although the relationship didn't work out, Carrie did benefit from their brief fling, writing about his bedroom interests in her column.

Wade Adams

Carrie met comic book store owner and budding artist Wade Adams (Cane Peterson) when he took over the shopfront her shoe repairman had previously occupied. Over the course of an episode, love seemed to be blooming for the pair amid their youthful excursions, which included pinball dates, scooter rides and splashing in kiddie pools.

Carrie even met Wade’s mom, Mrs. Adams, indulging in her homemade cookies, sharing dinners with her and chatting with her on the phone.

Her short-lived affair with Wade came to a screeching halt, though, after Mrs. Adams caught them smoking weed in her apartment. Faced with the wrath of his mother, Wade blamed the incident on Carrie, swiftly ending their evening — and their relationship.

Ray King

Ironically, Carrie met Ray, played by Craig Bierko, while on a friendly outing with Mr. Big. The jazz musician/bar owner proved to be a welcome respite from her on-again, off-again situation with Big. “There I was, inches away from my ex-boyfriend, friend, whatever, lusting after a bass player,” she mused.

Following an awkward cab ride for three and a date that was once again crashed by Big, the budding couple finally got some alone time, leading to what Carrie called “the most intense orgasm” of her entire life.

She quickly pumped the brakes when she realized that Ray couldn’t connect on an emotional level. “Maybe that kind of physical connection obliterates the chance of an intellectual one,” Carrie surmised.

Jack Berger

Fellow writer Jack Berger (Ron Livingston) accidentally crashed a meeting with Carrie’s publisher, leading to an instant attraction between the two. “Jack wrote a hilarious comic novel that speaks to men the same way your column speaks to women,” the publisher explained. “You two should talk.”

They took her up on her suggestion, and after a sweet afternoon in the park, Carrie was crushed to learn that Jack was not only taken but that he lived with his girlfriend. “I sparked with this person. I never spark,” she said.

Carrie let him go, and when the pair met again by chance, he was single. The breakup was fresh, however, and Jack was hesitant to jump into things with a new woman. “I ... wasn’t sure if I was up for all that again,” he explained. “Then I thought, ‘Maybe we should go out on a date before we break up.' ”

The two shared a brief courtship that led to love but became problematic when Jack’s career stalled as Carrie’s was taking off, causing him feelings of resentment.

His failure to get over his issues led to one of the most memorable breakups of all time: Jack left Carrie a Post-it with just seven words: “I’m sorry, I can’t. Don’t hate me."

Aleksandr Petrovsky

Aleksandr Petrovsky, played by Mikhail Baryshnikov, was Carrie's famous Russian artist boyfriend. He was in his early 50s when Carrie, then in her late 30s, sparked his interest by insulting the art in a performance they attended. Aleksandr, in turn, proceeded to sweep her off her feet with his sophisticated airs. “He is worldly and wise and very sexy,” she told her friends.

While Aleksandr, nicknamed “The Russian” by Carrie's friends, showed his new paramour a whole new side of New York, their relationship didn’t fare as well in Paris, where Carrie moved with Aleksandr in a giant leap of faith. Despite his grand romantic gestures, he worked long hours to ready his new exhibit in the city, leaving Carrie alone in a foreign place for much of their time together.

His distance sparked a heated argument between the two, during which he struck her cheek, effectively ending their relationship. As Carrie told him while saying goodbye, “I had a life in New York, I had a job and friends and I didn’t give all of that up to come here and wander the streets of Paris alone.”

Franklyn Silvias

Franklyn Silvias (Ivan Hernandez) was a producer for Carrie’s podcast before it was canceled in And Just Like That... The coworkers shared a mild flirtation throughout the show and eventually indulged in a steamy elevator kiss.

From there, they fell into a routine, having regular slumber parties every week. Franklyn wanted more, but Carrie wasn’t ready to take their relationship to the next level.

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