Gay men are male homosexuals. Historic terminology for gay men has included inverts and uranians.

Gay men continue to face significant discrimination in large parts of the world, particularly in most of Asia and Africa. In the United States and the western world, many gay men still experience discrimination in their daily lives, though some openly gay men have reached national success and prominence, including Apple CEO Tim Cook and heads of state or government such as Edgars Rinkēvičs (president of Latvia since 2023).

The word gay is recommended by LGBTQ groups and style guides to describe all people exclusively attracted to members of the same sex, while lesbian refers specifically to female homosexuals, and gay men to male homosexuals.

Some scholars argue that the terms "homosexual" and "gay" are problematic when applied to men in ancient cultures since, for example, neither Greeks or Romans possessed any one word covering the same semantic range as the modern concept of "homosexuality". Furthermore, there were diverse sexual practices that varied in acceptance depending on time and place. Other scholars argue that there are significant similarities between ancient and modern male homosexuals.

In cultures influenced by Abrahamic religions, the law and the church established sodomy as a transgression against divine law or a crime against nature. The condemnation of anal sex between males, however, predates Christian belief. Throughout the majority of Christian history, most Christian theologians and denominations have considered homosexual behavior as immoral or sinful. Condemnation existed in ancient Greece; for instance Plato, in his Laws, described male homosexuality as 'unnatural' and argued for its prohibition.

Many historical figures, including Socrates, Lord Byron, Edward II, and Hadrian, have had terms such as gay or bisexual applied to them. Some scholars, such as Michel Foucault, have regarded this as risking the anachronistic introduction of a contemporary construction of sexuality foreign to their times, though other scholars challenge this.

The first recorded possible homosexual male couple in history is commonly deemed to be Khnumhotep and Niankhkhnum, an ancient Egyptian couple, who lived around 2400 BCE. The pair are portrayed in a nose-kissing position, the most intimate pose in Egyptian art, surrounded by what appear to be their heirs. The 6th- or 7th-century Ashmolean Parchment AN 1981.940 provides the only example in the Coptic language of a love spell between men. More recently, the European colonization of Africa resulted in the introduction of anti-sodomy laws, and is generally regarded as the central reason why African nations have such stringent laws against gay men today. Three countries or jurisdictions have imposed the death penalty for gay men in Africa. These include Mauritania and several regions in Nigeria and Jubaland.

As is true of many other non-Western cultures, it is difficult to determine the extent to which Western notions of sexual orientation apply to Pre-Columbian cultures. Evidence of homoerotic sexual acts between men has been found in many pre-conquest civilizations in Latin America, such as the Aztecs, Mayas, Quechuas, Moches, Zapotecs, the Incas, and the Tupinambá of Brazil. In fact, in Aztec mythology, the deity Xochipilli was a symbol of gay men and male prostitutes.