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Halfway in-between, and we actually agree. We both like having two regular-sized pillows, but no extra little ones.

there should be an in-between answer... I have more than two pillows on my bed, but I also believe you should limit the total so as not to spend 3 years of your life putting pillows on the bed and taking them off again.

We need an in between here. More than 2 but less than "lots"?
I like a spare look but have found that one or additional pillows is a good way to change up for the seasons.

I have two to sleep with and 2 with shams and 1 small decorative pillow. I like the look of this especially because I don't have a headboard.

I voted for 2 but actually we have 4. I read the question, though, to mean only pillows that get used on the bed vs. mounds of decorative pillows that must then be dealt with every time the bed is actually slept in.

I will never understand the concept of pillows that are on a bed but not intended to be used when sleeping.

I like the look of extra pillows, but they usually end up on the floor when I sleep, so i don't see the point in them

I'm in between as well - 2 Euro Pillows and 2 standard sleeping pillows.

No throw-on-the-floor pillows.

Yup - in between. 2 sleeping pillows, 2 Euro shams, one accent pillow.

I acknowledge it's a pain, but two pillows just looks like an unmade bed most of the time.

I think pillows look really great at the store and a lot of them want to come home with me and live on my bed. They are really just stuffed animals without faces when you get down to it. I would add the 'more than 2' only because I have 4 pillows, the kind you put your head on when you sleep. I like the extra pillow height. I don't in actuality like the look of throw pillows on a made bed, but like I said, a few have just appealed to me at the store, but I can resist except the one time. An impulse buy that was super cheap and does nothing. Another is a knitted doll pillowcase that my mom found when she was cleaning out a lot of stuff from the basement, so it's a throw pillow now. My great-grandmother whom I've never met knitted it, so it is given better treatment than the store-bought one (and I think that's going in my outbox soon). So 6 pillows in total. 5 really. 3-ish. I don't have to take anything off the bed to sleep, so it's ok. Really.

i have "throw on the floor" pillows, but we never make the bed (unless we're having a party or the parents are coming to visit), so they are useless. i should really just get rid of them!

I prefer 4 pillows total. That said, my Fiance is a pillow FREAK and we currently have 12 .

4 regular pillows total. Something extra to lean on when you're sitting up in bed reading or computing. I didn't vote because none of the options seem to fit.

More than a couple of pillows looks nice, but it's an inconvenience to take them all off (and where do you put them?) at night when you're really tired.

I've been wondering about exactly this question lately - that is, what is the purpose of shams exactly? The only answer I could come up with is - to put on pillows that serve no purpose whatever. And then I wondered what one does with these purposeless pillows - throw them on the floor for the night? Ha! Apparently so! So why do comforters and other "bed sets" always come with pillow shams?

(Though I must confess, I have one tiny pillow that I like to tuck behind my neck when I'm reading, and it gets thrown on the floor when the light goes out. At least it doesn't wear a sham :-))

4 pillows. All regular. None for throwing on the floor.

Two. For sleeping. Cause really - any more are just wasting material and space.

I have four pillows on my bed. Two "sleeping" pillows and two "decorative sham" pillows. I always put my "sleeping" pillow layered on top of my "decorative" pillow when I sleep. I wouldn't be adverse to buying one more pillow whose purpose was solely aesthetic though.

I concur with the four pillows. Two regular and two with shams to match the bedset. Personally, I like to sleep with two but the bf only uses one. I used to like the decorative ones but he likes things more sparse.

Yet another vote for five -- two for sleeping with nice high thread count cases, two in shams for beefing up the height of the sleeping pillows when reading in bed and to cover the sleeping pillows decoratively when the bed is actually made (these just get shoved up by the headboard at night -- I'm short.) And one decorative toss pillow "for pretty". (Optional.)

I just moved after staging my old house to sell. Because it has the appropriate psychological impact, we used tons of toss pillows (gifts and flea market, mainly) for staging -- don't know if they helped, but we sold in a tough market for near to asking price to the first couple going through.

Now, just moving into my new home, all those pillows are piled on the floor, waiting to be donated or given to friends or something. It's a scarey heap!

i sleep with two pillows, so for years i only had two. then came the boyfriend, so i bought a third -- because i wasn't giving either of my pillows! then i learned he likes to sleep with two pillows, so now there are four on my bed.

all are functional. frilly, don't sleep on them because the shams are dry-clean-only pillows make me crazy.

we like two each for back support when reading.

Hubby and I agree on two. I am completely mystified by the appeal of the pile of pillows. I don't think they look nice at all. They just look like an obstacle to sleeping. What is good about that?

2 regular and 2 shams. The shams are used for support when reading.

2 baybe 4 for a king

Six. We each have a hard pillow, a squishy pillow, and a memory-foam pillow. I use vintage embroidered pillowcases, so they look nice any which way on the bed -- they don't have to be arranged just so.

Two is the best. I dated a girl once who literally had pillows on her bed all the way until about the halfway point. It was horrible. All you want to do is get-it-on, and then you kill the buzz while figuring out where to stash all the pillows. Silly.

We have four pillows, plus two throw pillows. Often we like to prop up and read (or play multiplayer DS) in bed, but for sleeping, the throw pillows get tossed on the old steamer trunk at the foot of the bed.

I grew up with my pillow-happy interior designer mother insisting beds look better with decorative pillows. LOTS of decorative pillows. By age 17, my bed had SEVEN pillows on it (only one was functional), plus a delicate Indian sari throw, and it all had to be centered juuuuust right!

My current bed has two (functional) pillows, and I prefer it that way. It shouldn't take 15 minutes to make a bed.

4 sleeping pillows (2 on each side) here too.

Another in-betweener - I have two pillows for sleeping on, and two behind it. Good to prop up the height for reading or something, then I can lie down flat and just use the one for sleeping.

I quite like the daily ritual of throwing all the extra pillows off and diving into bed. There's something unreasonably satisfying about it. I have 2 pillows for sleeping on, another two behind for the same reasons ryttu3k mentioned, and one 'feature' pillow in a statement colour.

three? two for me, one under my head one to keep me from rolling onto my stomach while side sleeping, and then one for him.

FEMALE: currently, i use 2. i used to do the whole throw pillow thing, but i realized it was kinda nuts if i didn't use them. i'm a big advocate for only using the bed for sleep. so, i don't need throw pillows to sit w/. i say only have the amount you ACTUALLY USE while sleeping.