Apparently contradictory reports in the literature concerning the acoustic streaming around a right‐circular cylinder immersed in a viscous, incompressible fluid can be reconciled by reference to a universal curve giving (δDC/a) as a function of (a/δAC), where δDCis theDCboundary‐layer thickness, δACis theACboundary‐layer thickness, andais the radius of the cylinder. The existence of such a curve has been verified experimentally for the case of a right‐circular cylinder vibrating to and fro in solutions of water and glycerin with kinematic viscosities ranging up to 50 times that of water, over an octave of frequencies. This experimental work also confirms theoretical predictions that for small oscillation amplitudes the streaming patterns will be the same whether the cylinder oscillates in a quiescent fluid or is fixed in an oscillating fluid. An approximate equation for the form of the universal curve has been obtained theoretically for the case of a thinACboundary layer, when the oscillation amplitude is small enough to insure the validity of a first‐order perturbation solution. Preliminary results of experimental work at higher amplitudes are reported, and the effect of the compressibility of the fluid on the streaming is discussed.