Ambiguous Gender in Webcomics.
A No Recent Examples rule applies to this trope. Examples for episodic works shouldn't be added until end of season for the season introducing the ambiguity (or after 3 months, for episodic works without seasons). This is to allow time for the story to develop the character and resolve ambiguity. There is no waiting time for non-episodic works.
- The Alchemist in Agents of the Realm is always referred to as "they" and wears a cowl, further obfuscating their gender.
- On account of the readily available body modifications and relaxed gender norms of the setting, several supporting and background characters in Always Human are this. Yasel mentions possessing breasts to go with an outfit as one would suggest putting on a different hat.
- The Hellsing fancomic And Shine Heaven Now continues this tradition for Heinkel, until it's revealed Heinkel is intersex.
- The Bedfellows: Fatigue exhibits masculine and feminine traits; other characters refer to Fatigue as a man or woman, Fatigue has a tampon in his purse, and in one episode, Fatigue appears to be peeing standing up in one episode when he's really pouring spoiled milk down a toilet. Additionally, Fatigue is shown to be the "woman of the house" compared to Sheen, and has Camp Gay tendencies.
- The Bird Feeder has Exotic, an exotic bird of indeterminate species and gender. The characters page
states, "It is of uncertain gender, as no one has ever taken the time to check." - None of the characters depicted in the comics of Fifteen Minds have any kind of gender indicator, and since there's no dialogue or written language, nothing is ever stated on the topic, out of apparently deliberate artistic choice in order to keep the focus on the artwork and events of the comics.
- Charby the Vampirate: King Samrick has a number of colorful feathered beings who have named themselves after their favorite foods working for him whose genders are not apparent.
- Styx in Coga Suro. Although originally appearing by taking over several nominally female characters, Styx's later appearances, in physical, robot bodies, only get more and more ambiguous.
- Dan and Mab's Furry Adventures:
- Fluffy from the No Fourth Wall segments. At one point during 'Reader Mail', Amber receives a letter questioning what gender Fluffy is, causing Fluffy to complain that "that's too stupid, even for the readers", walking away complaining about their obliviousness... as soon as they're off-panel, Amber admits that she doesn't know either, despite having created it.
- Mink seems to pass from Viewer Gender Confusion into canon ambiguity. Even Mink doesn't know what gender Mink is, let alone anyone else. All Cubi have the innate ability to freely switch between genders at will, meaning Mink could be any gender whenever they want. Mink is also The Ditz and so has forgotten what they are.
- Chacal from Da Pukas, no one knows Chacal's gender, except for Chacal, and they aren't telling. They even used it to taunt Artifice
- In Deep Rise Nobles don't have genders at all.
- The main character from Demon Eater, Saturno. At least, that's what the author tells us. Used as a plot point in later story arcs.
- Kanryl of Ears for Elves looks reasonably androgynous, though it seems many readers refer to "him" as male, and there is no word about what "his" gender actually is. Archmage has stated he's keeping a tally of how many people consider "him" male or female.
- Noah, from El Goonish Shive, whom we know as a boy only because it was said and in comparison to whom Tedd doesn't look "that androgynous" at all, despite this being an old Running Gag. Tedd himself falls into this, even in-universe. Even without resorting to Gender Bender technology or spells. At one point he finds he has a new spell that will turn him into a girl, whereupon he and his girlfriend Grace note how redundant that is.
- Gunnerkrigg Court,
- The processing of fairies and animals who want to become human and join the Court is done by a tall willowy person with no obvious characteristics. After they re-establish that animals become male to balance the all-female fairies, Annie asks if the processor is a former fairy or a former animal, and is told "Um ... neither. I'm from Cardiff."
- In City Face 2, our heroic pigeon develops a rivalry with Bobeyes, a magpie. In the eighth strip (of 10), The Rant refers to Bobeyes by female pronouns, which is the first and only indication of her gender. In the in-universe Shout Box, Magpie55 is taken aback to realise the "awesome tough guy" is a girl, although he later says "she is beautiful".
- Homestuck:
- Calmasis, a character in a book-within-a-webcomic is said to be "androgynous" and referred to as s/he. Whether this means Calmasis merely chooses to conceal their gender, is a person of non-binary gender identity, or is a non-human with No Biological Sex is as yet unknown.
- Calliope and Caliborn, who share a body, both have specific genders they identify with (Calliope being female and Caliborn being male), but the body they share is very androgynous-looking, having huge eyelashes, no hair and being flat chested. However, you can tell them apart by the colour of their cheek swirls. Adult cherubs appear externally male and female, though in the example we're given, if the female wins their mating duel she lays the egg inside the male. Presumably, if she lost, the male would fertilize her.
- Davepetasprite^2, a combination of a male human and a female troll (among other things), references this soon after coming into being: "Yo um... I'm confused about my gender suddenly. What am I now?"
- Minor animal characters (like Serenity the firefly or Vodka Mutini the cat) get this a lot, sometimes thanks to multiple name changes. Is John's adopted salamander the female Casey or the male Viceroy Bubbles von Salamancer? Is the Con Air bunny the same gender as Liv Tyler or Terry Kiser? Serenity's example is lampshaded, with the narrative revealing that WV is only guessing that she's a girl and even noting that he's "not even sure if fireflies can be girls"—a perspective that's not as silly as it sounds, as in some species, female fireflies are flightless and resemble larvae, which doesn't apply to Serenity at all.
- Insecticomics has fun with this: the giant androgynous robots are whatever gender and gender role they feel like being at the time. Thrust even changed gender to female as a mocking response to Lady Jaye's complaints about gay robots—and has kept it that way ever since, though no other aspects of her personality have shifted. Just to demonstrate how ambiguous the concept of gender can be around giant robots, another instance has the Insecticons changing Lazorbeak's gender through electoral fraud. This gender change also sticks.
- In Kaspall, the Captain is an androgynous bipedal rat from the city police force, and has never found it necessary to specify plumbing or pronouns on-screen. (As the author put it in the comments: "Feel free to assign [the Captain's gender/sex] as you like, as it has no bearing on this story whatsoever.")
- SPDA from Magic and Physics is ambiguous to the point the creators don't know.
- Monsterkind has Louise, who is later revealed by Word of God to be non-binary, and preferring they/them pronouns.
- Taking cues from The Order of the Stick, elves from Murphy's Law have much less noticeable secondary sexual characteristics.
- Nebula: The characters are all Anthropomorphic Personifications and are all canonically non-binary, though some look more masculine or feminine and use gendered pronouns.
- Neo Kosmos takes place in the distant future, where nearly all of humanity is extinct and the only survivors are raised by aliens with no concept of human ideas of gender; there are several different varieties of Ambiguous Gender at play.
- The (mostly alien) doctors simply refer to their charges as "human type x" and "human type y"; the humans themselves don't see gender as a thing that means anything to them, and use they/them pronouns; by and large they're all agender. The only exception is Iris, who is fascinated by ancient human culture and who thinks of herself as a girl.
- The compies are vaguely-feminine looking Lizard Folk, and are implied to either be a One-Gender Race (with that gender not nessesarily being male or female), or simply not to have gender at all. They all use they/them in most situations, but use she and her as terms of endearment with romantic partners.
- The Order of the Stick's Vaarsuvius is a prime example, much to the annoyance of their teammate Belkar. While they have a mate and two (adopted) children, their kids refer to them as "Parent" and "Other Parent". The Giant has stated that their gender will not be revealed, and anytime they are referred as "he" or "she", it is simply the other character's assumptions. V also has trouble telling genders apart, as seen when they fail to notice Roy's Gender Bender. A Patreon q&a clarified that he considers V genderqueer, but V would never identify that way because elf culture just flatly doesn't care.
- RJ from Paranatural wears a face-concealing hoodie and only talks when alone with Johnny's gang. They've since been confirmed to be non-binary and use they/them pronouns.
- Nobody knows what gender Pebble is from Pebble and Wren. They're probably male, but it's hard to determine. The creator has called them "he", but he's also called them "they", and even their own mother has called him "they", so maybe nobody knows.
- A lot of characters in Pilot are like this, so much so that they've come up with a solution: colored armbands that tell what pronouns you should use when referring to someone; Blue for he/him, Pink for she/her, purple for they/them, gray for xe/xyr, and green for people who don't care.
- Planetary Moe: Earth is androgynous and never gives a straight answer about what gender they are when one of the other characters tries to ask about it. Even their human name (Terry) is confirmed by the author to have been chosen because its unisex, giving no hints either way.
- The leads of Pon and Zi are designed to be gender-neutral to relate to everyone. You can identify them as whatever you like.
- Ky(lie) Coven from Rain. Although biologically female, Ky sometimes presents as a boy and sometimes as a girl depending on how they're feeling. There are also occasions where Ky prefers to identify as androgynous, though not too often. The author usually uses male pronouns for him in the commentary, though many characters and readers believe Ky is genderfluid.
- The Secret Knots: Nin Shieh, the new prince ('prince' being a ceremonial title for a sacrificial victim) in "The Tower", an androgynous child that the narrator isn't sure of the gender of.
- Sidekick Girl has Chris. However, it is Justified as Chris' power is causing confusion.
- Riley from Sire is invisible and hides their gender for the lulz.
- Rachael from Silver Bullet Nights. Although she identifies most frequently as female, she sports a flat chest, feminine hips and angular features. Occasionally she feels the need to indulge her "boy side" as she puts it.
- Pippin from Stupidity in Magic, the bisexual Author Avatar's boyfriend/girlfriend. The other characters treat him as male, but admit at intervals that they're not really sure, and the happy couple's keeping mum.
- Sydney Morgan from This Is Not Fiction is an anonymous romance novelist who the main character has fallen in love with. He's convinced that she's female but everyone else is not so sure.
- Although he is unquestionably male in canon now that Star Fox Command has come out, the VG Cats comic "It's Pat" (named for the above example) gives this status to Slippy from Star Fox, with Aeris and Leo following him to the loo to try to identify his gender — only to be foiled when instead of going into the male or female toilets, he pees in the break room.
