Get my free review

Data · Divorce and marriage

Divorce and marriage rates by state

How often people divorce and marry in each state, per 1,000 residents, every year since 2000, and how many divorces happen nationally each year. The figures are the CDC's National Center for Health Statistics' own, from the counts state health departments send it.

Divorce records cover the states that report divorces to NCHS: 45 states and DC in 2024.

Checked October 30, 2026 · CC BY 4.0 · Not legal advice

What is in this dataset?

Divorce rates (divorces and annulments per 1,000 residents, by state of occurrence) and marriage rates for every state that reports them to the CDC's National Center for Health Statistics, for 1990, 1995 and each year 2000 to 2024, with each reporting state's latest rate, its 2019 rate and its rate in 2000 (or its first reported year after 2000) and the change since; and the national provisional counts of divorces and marriages each year since 2000, with the states the national divorce count leaves out. Rates and counts only, as NCHS publishes them.

Use it to size divorce and family-law demand by state: where divorce is most common per resident, how fast it has fallen since 2000 and how many divorces happen nationally each year, beside the divorced residents and county detail in the legal-need dataset. Agents can look up a state, compare states, or search by state name or year.

Records
99
Look up by
52
state
Primary-source records
99

The letters are explained in what P, S, D and U mean.

Where does the data come from?

NCHS publishes three small workbooks: divorce rates and marriage rates by state for 1990, 1995 and 2000 onward, and the national provisional counts with their populations and rates. All three are read in full and only the rates NCHS prints are kept, as published. A gate checks that each year's national exclusion note names exactly the states without a rate, recomputes the national counts from the state rates and Census populations, re-downloads the files and re-reads 30 random cells.

Period covered
1990 to 2024
Places
The whole US, all 50 states and DC
How often we refresh it
Once a year
Records read
October 30, 2026

Official sources

The sources the records cite most

What does a record look like?

The full records add the dates, the quoted source text and every field in the CSV and JSON files below.

What each of the 18 main columns means
jurisdiction
Two-letter state code (50 states and DC), or US
level
us or state
kind
divorce (divorces and annulments) or marriage
stateName
State name (United States on the national records)
year
The latest year of the NCHS table (states without a rate that year have no record of that kind)
status
P: the NCHS figure as published
value
The rate in that year (the same as rate)
rate
Per 1,000 residents in the latest year
rate_2019
Per 1,000 residents in 2019
years_published
How many years have a published rate (1990, 1995 and 2000 onward for states; 2000 onward for the US)
years
Rate per year, every published year
count
National records only: provisional number of divorces and annulments, or of marriages, in the latest year
counts
National records only: the provisional number per year
population
National records only: the population of the reporting area NCHS used for the rate
base_year
The first year from 2000 on with a published rate (2000 for most states)
rate_base
Per 1,000 residents in base_year
change_since_base
rate minus rate_base
reporting_places
National records only: how many states (and DC) reported in the latest year, the area the national count and rate cover

How do I use it in my own tools?

marriagedivorce_lookup
For one two-letter state code (or US): the divorce rate and the marriage rate per 1,000 residents in the latest year, 2019 and 2000, and every year since 1990 (national counts for US).
marriagedivorce_compare
The divorce and marriage records of up to 10 states (or US) side by side.
marriagedivorce_search
Records whose text matches the words given, such as "divorce Texas", a state name or a year.

How to cite this dataset

You can reuse, adapt and republish this data, including commercially, under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license (CC BY 4.0). The only condition is that you credit Probative and link to the source.

Version
1.0.0, released October 31, 2026
Every version
10.5281/zenodo.23845897 (always points to the newest)
License
CC BY 4.0

Download the data

Free, no email or login. The files are hosted on this site and Zenodo, a public research archive.

Suggested citation

Probative. (2026). Marriage and divorce rates by state (CDC NCHS), 1990 to 2024 (Version 1.0.0) [Data set]. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.23845898

Credit line for a chart, table or article

Source: Probative, Marriage and divorce rates by state (CDC NCHS), 1990 to 2024, version 1.0.0, https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.23845898, licensed CC BY 4.0.

Add to a reference manager (Zotero, Mendeley, EndNote)

Not legal advice. These are provisional counts that state health departments send to NCHS, turned into rates per 1,000 residents. Divorce figures include annulments and, for some counties or states, petitions filed or legal separations. Divorce records cover the states that report divorces to NCHS: 45 states and DC in 2024.

What changed recently?

  • 2026-10-30 · NCHS divorce rates for 45 states and DC and marriage rates for 50 states and DC, 1990 to 2024, and the national counts: in 2024 662,950 divorces and annulments were reported (2.3 per 1,000 residents in the reporting states) and 2,128,446 marriages (6.3 per 1,000). (source)

The full log is in changes.json.

What are the limits?

  • Divorce figures include annulments and, for some counties or states, petitions filed or legal separations, as NCHS notes.
  • A divorce is counted in the state where it is granted, which may differ from where the couple lived.
  • Divorce figures cover the 45 states and DC that report divorces to NCHS, and the national divorce count and rate cover the same states.
  • The counts are provisional; NCHS revises earlier years when states send corrections.
  • Records older than 400 days since their last check are marked stale in the files until we re-check them. Every confirmed error we fix is listed in the data corrections log.

Found a wrong value? Report an error with the record id and the source that shows the right value.

Running a firm? You don’t need the raw data: we handle your state’s ad rules for you. See where your firm stands first.

Published by Probative Growth, a marketing agency for law firms. See our services and pricing.

Free

Get your free review.

Send us your firm’s website. Probative Growth records a 90-second video of what clients see when they look you up, and emails it with a one-page summary within 2 business days. No logins, no call needed.

Not sure where to start? Answer 7 questions Ready to talk? Talk to us Or see what AI says about your firm

Your free review: It covers your Google listing, website, phone and ads, from public information.

Step 2 of 2. Where should we send the video for your site?

We use this to send your video and to reply to you.

We use what you send to reply and to send a few short follow-up emails (unsubscribe any time). To learn which of our ads work, we tell Google, Microsoft and Meta that a request came in, with the ad you clicked (if any) and a hashed copy of your email (a code the platforms can still match to you), never your message. Never sold, never added to lists. Global Privacy Control or an email to us turns this off. By sending this form you agree to our privacy policy.

See every price