Ed Sheeran's Tattoos Range from Sentimental to Utterly Silly

Singer and songwriter Ed Sheeran is best known for his golden voice and his hit songs. With tracks like "Thinking Out Loud," "Perfect," "The Shape of You," and more, he's become an international sensation with a serious career at the top of the music industry.

But Ed isn't all seriousness and work. He's also pretty into playing hard and having fun. He's also heavily, heavily tattooed. So what do his tattoos stand for? They range from the sentimental and meaningful to the inane and hilarious. Here's what we know about Ed Sheeran's tattoos and the meaning behind them.

Considering the fact that he's all but covered in ink, it would be hard to go tattoo-by-tattoo and discuss their meanings. Luckily, the "Photograph" singer sat down with GQ Magazine to discuss some of the highlights of what he calls his "one tattoo," spanning over 60 images that connect across his arms, chest, and back.

In the interview, Ed shared that he grew up with parents who "worked in art."

His childhood was spent surrounded by art and colorful things, perhaps inspiring his future obsession with covering himself with the same.

His obsession with tattoos started as it often does, with him promising that he would just be getting one. At a tattoo shop owned by the family of singer Christina Perri, Ed got a pawprint tattoo on his forearm that he had drawn on his arm for years, thinking it would scratch the itch. Instead, it ignited a passion for ink that he hasn't slowed down on.

He also showed off three boxing gloves, which he got in honor of his third performance at Madison Square Gardens. It has a dual meaning, honoring his grandfather, a boxer, who passed just prior to the performances.

The sentimental tattoos don't stop there. He has tattoos drawn by his daughters and his kids' footprints on his back.

Many of his pieces mark milestones in his life, or moments of achievement, and a few in memoria.

But some of them are just plain silly. One tattoo reads, "lads on tour," which actually has nothing to do with his musical career. It's a phrase used when men go out pub-hopping together, and he suggested it to some friends on a night out.

One tattoo came from the music video for "Galway Girl," with Saoirse Ronan. She tattoos him in the video, and he joked it would be funny if she misspelled it. She actually tattooed him while they filmed, and it was misspelled intentionally, reading "Galway Grill" on his forearm.

Ed's casual approach to tattooing and the way he seems to embrace whatever feels right in the moment very much parallels his music and songwriting style.

After the "Galway Girl" tattoo made the rounds in the media, Ed seemed to be amused by the public reaction to the intentional misspelling.

In 2025, Ed sat down with the Call Her Daddy podcast, discussing at one point how he was incorporating his daughters' art into his ink. Ed shares two daughters with wife Cherry Seaborn: 4-year-old Lyra and 2-year-old Jupiter.

On the podcast, he shared that "My legs have actually started being my kids' drawing book." He added, "So my daughter's just done a little bunny rabbit for my leg and you can put the date of it. It's quite nice seeing it."

When asked if his daughters request their art to be tattooed on Ed or if he rather asks them, he responded, "Sort of that, yeah. Sort of that. Now she's like, she'll draw something and be like, 'Get it as a tattoo.' But yeah. I think I'm gonna get one for each of them every year."

Ed's love for his daughters and his encouragement of their creative expression follows naturally from the artistic childhood he was given by his parents. With a father so deeply enmeshed in the music world, it's likely they'll grow up being encouraged to express their creativity in endless ways.