ShortList is supported by you, our amazing readers. When you click through the links on our site and make a purchase we may earn a commission. Learn more

The 20 best one-liners from the 2017 Edinburgh Fringe Festival

Laugh-out-loud funny

The 20 best one-liners from the 2017 Edinburgh Fringe Festival
Tom Victor
18 August 2017

If you’ve been up to Edinburgh for the Fringe, you’ll know that the standard is best described as mixed.

For every hidden gem, there’s a free show that feels like it cost too much. And for every big-name performance that lives up to your expectations, there’s one to convince you to never see a famous comedian ever again.

With this year’s festival more than halfway done, plenty of publications – or individuals – are coming up with lists of the best one-liners they’ve heard this year.

We’ve picked out 20 of our favourites:

1. “Centaurs shop at Topman. And Bottomhorse” – Dan Antopolski

2. “I’m selling my old tennis equipment, but I can’t work out, what’s the net worth” – Samantha Baines

3. “Whenever someone says ‘I don’t believe in coincidences’, I say ‘Oh my god, me neither!’” – Alasdair Beckett-King

4. “We called both our cats Socks. We had two, but we lost one in the tumble dryer” – Cats FM (pictured above)

5. “I like to quote Star Wars while having sex. That’s how big a fan I am of having sex” – Ken Cheng

6. What’s a Sagittarius’ favourite Radio 4 Show? The Archers…because of their short attention spans” – Sian Docksey

7. “I like to think the guy who invented the umbrella was going to call it the ‘brella’ but he hesitated” – Andy Field

8. “The thing I like about Britain is I ain’t never been to anywhere in the world that gives people this much junk about being fair, on your radio shows, your TV shows, your newspapers. Imagine my surprise after Brexit, when you all turned into c*nts”

9. “So no one turned up to the first meeting of my Sarcasm Club - despite loads of people saying how much they were looking forward to it” – Milton Jones

10. “I’m very conflicted by eye tests. I want to get the answers right but I really want to win the glasses” – Caroline Mabey

11. “PC World – you’ve got to watch what you say in there” – Seymour Mace

12. “The Edinburgh fringe is such a bubble. I asked a comedian what they thought about the North Korea nuclear missile crisis and they asked what venue it was on in” - Gráinne Maguire

13. “My vagina is kind of like Wales. People only visit ironically” – Evelyn Mok

14. “A lot of people say I’m egocentric – but enough about them” – Phil Nichol

15. “My careers advisor used to say ‘Don’t dress for the job you’ve got, dress for the job you want’. I say he was a careers advisor, I later found out he was a mechanic dressed as a careers advisor” – Josh Pugh

16. “Oregon leads America in both marital infidelity and clinical depression. What a sad state of affairs” – Paul Savage

17. “I was struggling to make friends, so I bought a book called ‘How to Make People Like You’. Turns out it was all about cloning” – Hari Shriskantha

18. “My mum doesn’t sugarcoat things…she’s diabetic” – Chris Turner

19. “I went to a Pretenders concert. It was a tribute act” – Tim Vine

20. “In the bedroom, my girlfriend really likes it when I wear a suit, because she’s got this kinky fantasy where I have a proper job” – Phil Wang

(Main image: Shaun Ferraloro)