The Truth About Princess Diana's Relationship With Sarah Ferguson

As both Princess Diana and Sarah Ferguson certainly learned quickly, marrying into the royal family comes with lots of press speculation about the feuds and friendships within the family. Just take a look at all of the stories about Princess Catherine and Meghan Markle's dynamic that've dominated the British press.

It turns out, these two aren't the first royal sisters-in-law to face endless scrutiny in the tabloids. When Sarah Ferguson tied the knot with Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor in 1986, she became Diana's sister-in-law, and the press quickly whipped up reports of what was said to be a very up and down relationship. Naturally, the tabloids loved following and fueling the feud rumors.

But what really went on between Diana and Sarah? Were the tabloids to be believed, or is there actually more to the story? Here is the truth about the relationship between Princess Diana and Sarah Ferguson.

While Princess Catherine and Meghan Markle's relationship began after the latter met Prince Harry, Princess Diana and Sarah Ferguson met long before they married into the royal family. The royal sisters-in-law were actually distantly related. They were both descendants of Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire, who'd been born a Spencer, like Diana. This made them fourth cousins. It seems it's a pretty small world when it comes to the British aristocracy.

In addition to being distant cousins, Diana and Sarah's social circles crossed when they were still kids. Their mothers had once been schoolmates, and the two future royals had known each other since childhood. When Diana lived in Chelsea during her engagement to the future King Charles III, Sarah was part of her friendship circle, too. The two reportedly became really close during this period, thanks to their mutual interests and friends.

Because Princess Diana and Sarah Ferguson were close friends and distant relatives, it was pretty surprising that Diana didn't invite Sarah to her wedding reception at Buckingham Palace after the larger ceremony. According to royal expert Tom Quinn, the snub didn't go unnoticed. As he said in the documentary "Fergie Vs Diana: Royal Wives at War" (via Express), "I think she was astonished to discover she wasn't being invited to the wedding breakfast." In fact, Sarah was so hurt by the snub that she was left feeling "quite worthless and unfit as a person," according to psychologist Jo Hemmings.

However, the documentary revealed that it hadn't been Diana's idea to leave her friend out of the reception. As it turns out, Diana actually wanted Sarah to be there. She'd even wanted to name her as one of her ladies-in-waiting. However, as royal commentator Lizzie Cundy explained, "I think the Royal Family felt Sarah wasn't posh enough," she revealed. Apparently, it was during this period that tensions began to form in the women's friendship.

Regardless of the drama surrounding the royal wedding, Sarah Ferguson and Princess Diana's remained incredibly close in the early years of Diana's marriage to King Charles III. In the documentary "Fergie Vs Diana: Royal Wives At War" (via Express), experts on the royal family explained that Diana saw Sarah as a loyal and trusted friend at the time. In fact, she relied on having weekly catch-ups with her confidant. As author Kate Nicholl said, "They would frequently meet for lunch. Often once a week." If lunch wasn't possible, Sarah would come to the Palace for tea.

Nicholl noted that Diana's lunches with Sarah helped her to adjust to her new, royal life. "She would really lift Diana and make her laugh, which Diana really needed at that time," she added. Sounds like the two women's friendship was especially important to Diana in those difficult early years of being a princess.

It seems that Sarah Ferguson's friendship really did have a significant impact on Princess Diana in her early years as a royal. Apparently, Sarah recommended her astrologer, Penny Thornton, to Diana in 1986. As it turns out, Sarah's recommendation came at a crucial moment in the princess's life. As Thornton told Vogue Australia in 2019, Diana was desperate for help. "I just want to know if there's a light at the end of the tunnel," the late royal reportedly said at the time.

During their first meeting, Thornton tried to help Diana "turn her situation around from being a passive victim, to an active member of the royal family who was equal to her husband." Additionally, Thornton explained to the Daily Mail (via Express) that her advice worked, as Diana had been on the verge of running away from her marriage to King Charles III. "She was going to bolt and she didn't," the astrologer revealed. "That Christmas I had a card signed by Charles." Sarah also wrote to express her thanks. According to Vogue Australia, Thornton went on to work with Diana for six years.

Even though Princess Diana's royal rank was higher than hers, Sarah Ferguson still felt like she had to look out for her longtime friend. "She was two years younger than I, and I strove to support and protect her as I would a younger sister — as I still do today, as a best friend," Ferguson wrote in her 1996 autobiography, "My Story."

At the time of her marriage, Diana was still very young, just 19 years old when King Charles III, who was then still a prince, popped the question. As Sarah's friend Lizzie Cundy explained in "Fergie Vs Diana: Royal Wives at War" (via Express), "Diana looked up to Sarah because she was so flamboyant." And as psychologist Jo Hemmings put it, "By the time [Sarah] was in her 20s, she'd had two live-in relationships...so at that point, when Diana was very young, those two years must have seemed incredibly significant." However, by the sound of things, their friendship evened out as Diana grew older. 

Princess Diana was the person who matched Sarah Ferguson up with the man who would become her future ex-husband, Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor. In 1985, Diana asked Queen Elizabeth II to invite Sarah to one of her "dine and sleep" events during Ascot week — essentially, it sounds like a fancy royal sleepover. Diana arranged for Sarah to sit next to Andrew at lunch, and the rest is history.

When Diana found out about Sarah and Andrew's connection, she was apparently eager to help her friend with the budding romance. She even invited Sarah and Andrew to visit Highgrove, her country house, where they could get to know each other better before the relationship became public. Just one year later, the pair were engaged — and Diana was on the verge of getting a brand new sister-in-law.

Once Sarah Ferguson entered into the royal family, her dynamic with Princess Diana shifted. While Sarah had once tried to protect the young princess, she then began to look up to Diana for advice and guidance. When Diana had announced her engagement to King Charles III, she faced hordes of tabloid photographers on a daily basis; for Sarah, it was no different. As Sarah revealed in "My Story," Diana's years of experience in front of the press proved helpful.

In the book, Sarah recalled one moment when she and Diana had been swarmed by the press. "I looked over at my friend in befuddlement," Sarah wrote. "'Just keep smiling,' Diana whispered." As Sarah explained, this was advice she would heed from that point forward. As she put it, "I always felt safe in mimicking Diana."

Every now and again, Princess Diana and Sarah Ferguson got into a little mischief. In 1986, Sarah came up with the idea to crash her husband-to-be's stag party by dressing up as a police officer. She roped Diana into her plan, and the pair went to Annabel's nightclub in London to drink champagne and orange juice in costume. As the club's manager explained to Express, the women were very convincing. "They were perfectly disguised and certainly had us fooled," he recalled. As Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor — who was then still known as Prince Andrew — made his way back to Buckingham Palace after the night out, Diana and Fergie stopped his car.

As Diana's biographer Andrew Morton wrote in "Diana: Her True Story — In her Own Words," this excursion was "[t]he first signal of the change in Princess Diana's behaviour." And, as Morton pointed out, impersonating a police officer is technically illegal. Apparently, the typically reserved Diana had been influenced by her more outgoing, daring friend. 

After Sarah Ferguson joined the royal family, her relationship with Princess Diana became a little more complex. While Diana was often called "Shy Di" in the press, the former Duchess of York was often described by reporters as being more laid back and outgoing. Sarah also made an excellent first impression on members of the royal family.

Sarah won over the monarch by getting her pilot's license, and she also bonded with Queen Elizabeth II's husband by open carriage driving. The former Duchess of York also liked the same sports as many members of the royal family, like skiing and horseback riding, neither of which interested Diana.

As Diana said to Andrew Morton in "Diana: Her True Story — In Her Own Words," "[Sarah] wooed everybody in this family and did it so well. She left me looking like dirt." Apparently, King Charles III had even expressed a wish that Diana could be more "jolly" like her friend. "I got terribly jealous [of Fergie] and she got terribly jealous of me," Diana said.

Because Princess Diana and Sarah Ferguson were extremely close, the palace kept an eye on the duo's friendship. In the early days of Sarah's marriage to Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, it seemed like Diana's connection to Fergie was a good thing. However, as time went on, palace officials began to wonder whether or not the Princess of Wales really needed to be spending so much time with the then-Duchess of York.

The main issue in Sarah and Diana's friendship was public image. While Diana was the beloved "People's Princess" who made friends all across the globe, Fergie was a more scandal-ridden figure. Indeed, the dramatic rise and fall of Sarah Ferguson took place more than once over the years. After a while, palace officials started to fear that Sarah's scandals would rub off on Diana as well.

Speaking to this point, royal expert Andrew Lownie told the Daily Mail in 2026 that Diana also began to share these worries. "There were some concerns Diana had that Fergie perhaps was too boisterous, and she was kind of undermining Diana's own reputation," Lownie explained. As a result of Diana's private worries, her friendship with Fergie started to cool off. Or, as Lownie put it, "She began to distance herself.

Despite Princess Diana's feelings of jealousy, she continued to rely on Sarah Ferguson as a close friend and confidant throughout her marriage. Eventually, they both found themselves increasingly unhappy in their respective marriages. By 1991, Diana found that Sarah was the only one who could understand what she was going through, and vice versa. "It was the year we first put words to the unspeakable idea that had been nudging us in the ribs for some time: that one or both of us might leave the royal family," Sarah wrote in "My Story."

After that, the pair began to plot and scheme of how they might escape their unhappy marriages and sever their ties to the royals. "We burned the phone wires into the night, trading secrets and jokes that no-one else would understand," Sarah added.

According to the Daily Mail, Diana was having an affair with an art dealer called Oliver Hoare at the time, and apparently the two women even used the name of the road where Hoare lived as a code word. "It meant our leap of freedom," Diana reportedly told royal reporter Richard Kay.

In 1992, Sarah Ferguson and Princess Diana officially separated from their respective royal husbands. By 1996, both of their divorces had been finalized, and the women were free to go their own ways. Yet again, the two friends found themselves in a unique position that only the other could fully comprehend. Understandably, they relied on each other for support during this period. 

To celebrate their freedom, Sarah and Diana set off on a trip to the South of France with their children. The two former sisters-in-law arrived in July, and stepped off their private plane into three limousines to avoid the press. During their getaway, Diana and Sarah stayed in a chateau in the village of Seillans where they spent their time playing in the pool and relaxing on the patio. But sadly, they were still plagued by paparazzi and fans throughout the trip.

Sarah Ferguson and Princess Diana may have overcome plenty of ups and downs in their relationship, but in 1996, they cut off contact for good. Things went sideways after the publication of Sarah's book, "My Story." Apparently, Diana had hoped that the memoir wouldn't spill too much personal information about their friendship. Alas, the former Duchess of York couldn't help herself. Not only did "My Story" include extensive commentary about Diana's friendship with Fergie, but it also claimed that Diana had given Fergie warts. 

As royal expert Andrew Lownie dished to the Daily Mail in 2026, Diana felt that she could no longer trust Fergie to keep her secrets safe. "'The reality was that Diana was very concerned that Sarah Ferguson might well be selling stories about her, and that relationship was never repaired, though Sarah Ferguson pretended it had," Lownie revealed.

Diana, apparently, had reason to be concerned. In the same interview, Lownie described the way that Diana had opened up to Fergie before "My Story" was published. "Diana would come to Sarah Ferguson every Sunday, and they would moan about the royal family. They both felt very restricted within the confines of the royal family," he shared. Given the nature of the secrets that Diana had revealed to Fergie over the course of their friendship, it made sense that the People's Princess felt uncomfortable with appearing in "My Story." Their relationship was never the same after.

Sadly, Sarah Ferguson and Princess Diana were still estranged before the latter's tragic death in 1997. As Sarah confessed to Harper's Bazaar in 2018, not making up with Diana was one of her biggest regrets. "Because we were like siblings...we rowed," she explained. "And that's the saddest thing, at the end, we hadn't spoken for a year, though I never knew the reason."

Sarah went on to explain that she attempted to mend the relationship prior to Diana's death by writing letters to the princess. "I knew she'd come back," Sarah continued. "In fact, the day before she died she rang a friend of mine and said, 'Where's that Red? I want to talk to her.'" Given their long history, it should come as no surprise Sarah attended Diana's funeral.

Sarah Ferguson has had some public ups and downs with Princess Diana's sons. On one hand, Prince William and Princess Catherine didn't invite her to their wedding. On the other, Sarah has defended Prince Harry and Meghan Markle over the years. It is understood that her relationships with both princes have suffered in light of ex-husband Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor's friendship with Jeffrey Epstein, but before the scandal broke, Sarah had a positive rapport with Harry and Meghan. She even helped Meghan prepare to meet Queen Elizabeth II for the first time, giving her tips on performing the perfect curtsy.

Recalling this episode in a now-iconic 2021 interview with Oprah Winfrey, per Hello!, Meghan explained, "Right in front of the house we practiced and ran in. Fergie ran out and said, 'Do you know how to curtsy?'" Meghan did not. Sarah patiently explained the mechanics of the move to Meghan, who ultimately performed her curtsy with ease. Harry and Meghan left a good first impression on the queen — presumably thanks to Fergie's support.

Time and time again, Sarah has made a point of speaking kindly about both princes. As she told People in 2021, "[Diana] would be very proud of her sons and their wives. ... If she were sitting with me right now, I know she would say, 'I am so proud of both of my boys and the wonderful wives they have chosen.'"